Painful 'Bounty' another Jennifer Aniston dud

Kyle Smith
Blog: Movies

MOVIE REVIEW

THE BOUNTY HUNTER As tacky as Rielle Hunter. Running time: 106 minutes. Rated PG-13 (some violence, profanity, sexual content). At the Lincoln Square, the Kips Bay, the 34th Street, others.

I can believe a guy can be thrown off a downtown New York building (at “Sixth and Rivington”) and investigators would be too dumb to figure out it wasn’t a suicide. I can believe a reporter who bumped into a police horse with her car could be thrown in jail on $50,000 bail. What I can’t believe is that any woman who looks like Jennifer Aniston can be found working at the Daily News.

City reporter Nicole (Aniston) — the ace journo whose talent becomes apparent when we get a glimpse of her story headlined “Fighting Parking Tickets Gets Tougher” — skips a court date because she’s chasing the phony suicide story, so her ex, Milo (Gerard Butler), is hired as “The Bounty Hunter” tasked with tracking her down.

Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler can create buzz with a “real” romance, but their pairing on “The Bounty Hunter” makes for a gruesome twosome.

Photos: A 'Bounty' of Jen & Gerard

Nicole and Milo, despite their recent divorce, are kinda sweet on each other — you can tell by the way they keep saying they hate each other — so while we await the inevitable ending, they “banter,” i.e. exchange some of the dullest lines you’ll see this spring that are not actually included in the instructions to your 1040 form. Looming in the distance is a mandatory candlelit dinner at which the lovebirds will begin to coo again, with soundtrack piano set on Maximum Tinkle.

PHOTOS: A 'BOUNTY' OF JEN & GERARD

PHOTOS: GERARD BUTLER'S LADY CONQUESTS

Meanwhile, to soak up screen time, we dip into the background to check in with a nerdy suitor (Jason Sudeikis) who thinks he’s rescuing Nicole but keeps getting tortured by the bad guys for no reason except maybe for fun, and Nicole’s horny old-bat lounge-singer mom (Christine Baranski, done up like Endora on “Bewitched”), who demands a cellphone photo of Milo’s bare bottom at the earliest opportunity.

Someday, “The Bounty Hunter” and last month’s “Cop Out” will be featured in a cable movie double bill as the two worst 1988 films of 2010. This one replays "Midnight Run," except now the Charles Grodin figure has soft glowy hair of solar-panel wattage.

The photovoltaic lustrousness of the Aniston mane is the only energy source present, and if the two leads did indeed get it on off-screen, they certainly don't bring it off on-screen. The feuding lovebirds lug their rusty badinage down to Atlantic City for a series of thinly cloaked ads for the Borgata and the Trump Taj Mahal. Then they make their way back up here, to the big city, to solve a dirty-cop mystery of such waiting-in-line-at-the-post-office tediousness that I could actually feel unused neurons turning as brown and crispy as autumn leaves.

PHOTOS: GERARD BUTLER

PHOTOS: JEN ANISTON, GERARD BUTLER FLIRT AT THE GOLDEN GLOBES

No particular reason is given for the couple's breakup, except that they have would-be cute little spats. Yet it seems unlikely that anything Milo previously did to Nicole to drive her away could be as unforgivable as what he now does when wooing her back. This includes locking her in the trunk while he drives, pulling a gun on her and handcuffing her to a bed all night. His behavior would be considered shocking in any man who isn't a New York state senator.

Dialogue. I won't quote more than one line per paragraph because I don't want any cerebral hemorrhages on my conscience.

"It's powerful, it's dangerous, it's hard. That would be my gun."

"If it's your birthday, Milo thinks the best present is the gift of nothing."

"I'm pretty sure the only guy around here that wants to kill you is me" is said just as one of several easily foiled master villains drives up alongside and starts shooting.

When trying to fake membership in a country club, Nicole and Milo tell the membership director, "We know John. You know John?"

An exchange that sounds like it was cut from the shooting script of "Love Story" goes, "I mean, life is about making mistakes." The reply: "And death is about wishing you'd made a lot more."

This last big idea is positioned as the turning point, the magic moment of understanding. Perhaps the filmmakers envision themselves in old age saying, "Dang you, Grim Reaper! I wish I'd turned down all those masterpieces and made more bad movies." Judging by the number of putrid films Aniston -- and even, despite a late start, Butler! -- have managed to churn out, I don't think that thought will ever cross their minds.

kyle.smith@nypost.com