It is no surprise that in many ways human beings reflect what their parents must have been. There is a biological perspective to it as this has a lot to do with the fact that children carry their parents' genes in them. However, there is no definitive yardstick for determining the behavioral traits of children as they might or might not have been influenced by their parents. All these ideas tend to give rise to an inherent desire to know more about one's parents especially 'one's biological parents'. This is a challenging as well as a serious theme which has been humorously represented on screen by American director David O Russell. For this reason, he takes us on a hilarious, fun filled ride across two different parts of America where a married couple meets up with other oddball characters. Apart from discussing issues related to bad parenting, 'Flirting with disaster' talks about a couple's conjugal life after the birth of a baby. Although most people would not like to be found in a position to generalize a work of art, this film remains a good example of American attitudes to drugs, marriage, relationships and sexuality. Hilarity is ensured as each character carries multiple flaws.

A young man (Ben Stiller), his wife (Patricia Arquette), and his incompetent case worker (Tea Leoni) travel across country to find his birth parents.I watched this because it was Tea Leoni's birthday, and because I figured being a film from David Russell it could not be too bad. Boy, was that a mistake. This was pretty bland, to say the least. I do not want to give it a lower rating because it was not actually bad, but it was pretty lackluster as a comedy.On the message boards, it seems that this was considered one of the better comedies of the 1990s. That is a sad thing. I grew up in the 1990s, and it had some great comedies. This is not a film I would add to that list... maybe not even in the top 100.

I submit there is never a single non-funny minute in this masterpiece of screwball comedy. How in heaven's name were these actors able to keep a straight face making this? Tea Leoni, especially, greets each new disaster with insincere mortification so effectively that it is the movie's best running gag.To recap, Ben Stiller is a husband, new father and adopted son of archetypely loud and quarrelsome Jewish New York parents George Segal and Mary Tyler Moore. Ben wants to find his "roots," i.e., birth parents. He has enlisted the help of adoption case worker Tea Leoni, whose somber professional manner conceals incompetence of colossal proportions.So begins a road movie as Ben, Tea and Ben's wife, played by a physically lush Patricia Arquette, and their baby set out on the quest, which seems simple at first. What they are actually plunging into is an incredibly complicated unfolding of an adopted child's real history.There's no point in going into the plot in more depth. Suffice it to say that no sooner does one set of crazy people, all of whom seem perfectly normal at first, exit the movie than a new set of crazy people pops up.Favorite scene? I'd have to say LSD "guide" Lilly Tomlin trying to talk down an LSD-lit-up Richard Jenkins. The destruction of the post office comes in a close second. Oh, but wait, there's the armpit-licking scene. And ... I give up. David O. Russell, the writer/director, take a bow.

An adopted man goes searching for his birth parents. Hilarity ensues. Not really. Actually there are zero laughs for the first half hour or so. The first chuckle is supplied when Brolin enters the picture as a gay Federal agent. From that point, it becomes mildly amusing, thanks to a terrific cast. It's nice to see the likes of Moore, Segal, Tomlin, and Alda, although sexual scenes of these old-timers is the kind of imagery one does not want lingering in the mind. This film provided Stiller with a career template for playing neurotic men who keep encountering disaster, but the script here is not as witty and the plot not as engaging as some of his later efforts.