GIVEN recent events, Gigli may be the last opportunity you'll have to see Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck together, going gooey eyed over each other. However, voyeuristic curiosity alone will not be enough to save Martin Brest's unconventional romantic comedy.

Gigli is a bad film, marking a career-low for both of its leads, which is a damning indictment indeed when you consider Lopez's last movie was the interminable Maid In Manhattan.

However, it's not nearly the disaster that the American critics would have you believe.

Amid the morass of unintentionally hilarious dialogue, poorly conceived characters and risible plotting, there is a sweet yet slight movie struggling to get out.

Lowly thug Larry Gigli (Ben Affleck) is assigned to kidnap Brian (Justin Bartha), the psychologically-challenged younger brother of a powerful federal prosecutor, who is threatening to put mob boss Starkman (Al Pacino) behind bars.

Larry's boss, Louis (Lenny Venito), is concerned that the young hoodlum might screw up the simple assignment, and so Louis hires feisty female gangster Ricki (Jennifer Lopez) to lend her considerable expertise.

The dialogue is frequently cringe-worthy, like a running joke about Ricki and Larry being like animals, which results in her now infamous bedroom come-hither, "It's turkey time!" and his observation that, "In every relationship, there's a bull and a cow." He moos to emphasise his point. Bull indeed.

Rating: 4/10

DAMON SMITH