if there's one thing sandra bullock desperately needs , it's a decent script to get her career restarted . after a series of flops ( " speed 2 " , " forces of nature " ) , she needs a good script with a good costar . well , " gun shy " is a rather entertaining script , and she has the always great liam neeson as her costar , but there are two serious problems : first , the film was released at what could be the worst possible time , the same weekend as " scream 3 . second , sandra bullock appears in perhaps six scenes throughout the film . everyone finished gasping in disbelief ? that's right folks , despite what the previews may have led you to believe , " gun shy " is hardly a romantic comedy because there is seldom a female presence . the thing is , the film might be better as a result . charlie mayough ( liam neeson ) is an undercover dea officer who is on his last assignment before retirement . the problem is , he can't bring himself complete the assignment unless he constantly attends group therapy to keep his nerves under control . charlie's final assignment involves catching illegal funds on a group of mafia types , led by the uptight fulvio ( oliver platt ) . as a result of charlie's nerves , he's having another problem , which involves his , uh , bowles . well , he visits a proctologist named jane ( sandra bullock ) , who promises she can fix all his anxiety problems in two weeks by dating him . it's not very often that a romantic subplot feels quite so tacked on as it does here . bullock's character serves absolutely no purpose , other than to give charlie occasional words of encouragment and to solve his prostatic difficulties . in fact , if her character had been eliminated entirely and more of the film had focused on oliver platt and his cohorts , this probably would have been a much better film . speaking of oliver platt , he is a riot as a hit man who hates being made up entirely of cliches . the truth is , oliver platt makes this movie . liam neeson may be a great actor , but he isn't given much to work with here . platt , on the other hand , is given some truly great scenes . for example , near the start of the film , platt is seated across from a neighbor , telling him that in the middle east they chop the hands off thieves . he then prepares to do this to the neighbor for reasons we're not quite sure of , but it's hysterical when we find out . charlie's sessions with his therapy group are fairly amusing , particularly when he runs into one of them while on assignment . unfortunately , any other time when oliver platt is not on screen , things tend to drag some . we're also introduced to someone that may possibly be the most irritating character i've seen in years . jason ( i believe played by andrew lauer ) is a big time wallstreet dealer , who shows up to invest the gangsters' money . he is about five foot ten , has an obnoxious , high pitched voice , and laughs insanely at everything . after seeing him on screen for about ten minutes , i really wanted to kill this character with my bare hands . i was tempted to knock a half star off my rating simply because he was present . the other supporting characters , while certainly eccentric , are more amusing than annoying . watch for an appearance by mitch pileggi , of x-files fame , as charlie's boss . the funny thing is , it's almost the exact same character he plays in " the x-files " . one last thing i must note is that i had a very hard time imagining a beautiful proctologist going out with one of her patients right after attending to him . i had an even harder time believing that charlie could have made it through the first date without constantly thinking about everything she had seen . " gun shy " is obviously not an incredible comedy . it is , however , an amusing , harmless little comedy that has has a lot of chuckles and a few true belly laughs . the film may only run 100 minutes , but things do tend to drag a bit by the end , which is drawn out well past what is needed . i'd recommend the film to fans of liam neeson and oliver platt , but not to fans of sandra bullock , since there isn't much of her in it . i give it three and a half out of five stars . comments ? feel free to e-mail them to : <a href= " mailto : johnbeachem@dependentfilms . net " >johnbeachem@dependentfilms . net</a>for past reviews , movie news , and other fun stuff , visit : www . dependentfilms . net * * * * * - one of the greatest movies ever made , see it now . * * * * - great flick . try and catch this one . * * * - okay movie , hits and misses . * * - pretty bad . see it if you've got nothing better to do . * - one of the worst movies ever . see it only if you enjoy pain . 
