DVD Review - What's Your Number?

Much like the Oscar-nominated Bridesmaids, this film begins with a woman breaking up with a guy because ultimately he's only interested in being a sex buddy. Zachary Quinto doesn't get as much as a comedic arc as Jon Hamm in Bridesmaids, but it's still a great beginning.

Zachary Quinto (Star Trek) plays Rick. Much like the Oscar-nominated Margin Call, another of Quinto's films, the following scene here is someone getting fired. It's not Stanley Tucci, but, instead the lovely Anna Faris who plays Ally Darling. Ally loses her marketing job in Boston, which sends her on a bit of a tailspin.

Ally reads in Marie Claire magazine that the average number of sexual partners for American women throughout their lives is 10.5. The magazine asks if that number is too high or low. Ally goes back in her mind and counts her sexual partners. Ally finds that her number is 19. The magazine posits that if a woman's number is 20 or higher then her likelihood of getting married diminishes.

Ally doesn't want to tempt the fate that this magazine is proposing, so she decides to stop having sex with new people. After running into an ex-boyfriend who has become a better person than when she was dating him, she wonders if maybe she could go back to an ex-boyfriend and make it work with him.

Since Ally isn't on Facebook or Twitter and since her Google searches yield no fruit just nuts, she enlists a private investigator and aspiring musician named Colin who lives in the apartment across from hers to assist in the tracking of her exes. Chris Evans plays Colin and the first time we see him he's naked.

Chris Evans is now famously the actor playing the titular character in Captain America and the subsequent Marvel films. Captain America has an often replayed shot of Evans emerging shirtless as a huge, muscle-bound, He-man. It is perhaps enhanced with CGI, but Evans did put in serious time at the gym. Yet, Evans only gets to show off his buff body once. Here, however, Evans gets to be more than shirtless but nearly nude and nearly nude numerously.

But, despite the fact that Ally has Colin, a gorgeous guy with a gorgeous body who's interesting, funny and enjoys Ally's sense of humor as well as her quirks and weird hobbies, Ally doesn't want to hook up with Colin. Why? She doesn't like that he's done exactly what she's done.

Ally has a high number of which at first she's not apologetic. She balks at her girlfriends, except for one, for thinking a woman with that high a number is a slut. Prior to reading the magazine and even up to discussing it with her friends, Ally didn't have a problem with it. Colin essentially is her male equivalent. He's initially portrayed as a horn dog, but seemingly less of a predator than Ryan Gosling's character in Crazy, Stupid, Love.

Yet, we're led to believe that Colin is banging a different girl every night, or at least a different girl every week. Therefore, Colin could have achieved Ally's number, which took her a lifetime to build, over the course of a summer. That could be off-putting to any woman, no matter how slutty she is.

Except, after a while, it's obvious that Ally and Colin have great chemistry and great repartee. Faris is no slouch herself in the body department. She strips down to her bra and panties at one point. Director Mark Mylod, who first utilized Faris on Entourage in 2007, shoots her here occasionally from either high angles or low angles, proving how great a rack she has and how great her ass is.

It's clear that both Faris and Evans are attractive and fun. It's also clear that these two will be a love match. The only question is if the courtship is entertaining or evocative and if that which makes the couple finally decide to be together is believable. I would say yes, an enthusiastic yes to the first question, and a solid no to the second.

What helps is that the series of guys or ex-boyfriends that Ally rediscovers are played by a series of actors who are all superb. It starts with Quinto and goes through Joel McHale, Chris Pratt and Andy Samberg who has a hilarious if brief puppet scene not unlike the one in The Beaver, as well as Anthony Mackie, Dave Annable and Aziz Ansari. If you don't know these guys, then I can't stress enough how amazing they all are.

But, it's not just the men. The women here, the supporting female actors, are all amazing and refreshing in how funny and natural they all are, even if their characters are one note. Included is Blythe Danner who plays Ally's disapproving, snobbish mother and Eliza Coupe (Happy Endings) who plays Ally's more liberated friend, Sheila. Ari Graynor plays Ally's sister, Daisy who is engaged to be married.

One last note about Anna Faris is how great an actress and how great a comedic actress she is. The first time I saw Faris was on the Wayans Bros. movie. She's been rather undervalued ever since. She had a great dramatic turn in Entourage, but I think this movie pushes her value up as far as I'm concerned.

Five Stars out of Five.
Rated R for sexual content and language.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 46 mins.