Although Jennifer Aniston has become the closest thing to a movie star among Friends alumni, that doesn’t say much. Outside of the sitcom hit, she’s really best known as Brad Pitt’s ex. A few of her flicks have done reasonably well, but most have fizzled.

Today’s example of that trend: 2010’s The Bounty Hunter. Though its $66 million gross means it didn’t crash and burn, it certainly didn’t find a broad audience.

Newspaper reporter Nicole Hurley (Aniston) gets arrested after a minor car-related altercation with a cop. When she skips a court appointment to pursue a hot story, she officially becomes a fugitive and a bounty hunter picks up her case to bring her to the authorities.

But not just any bounty hunter. Former cop Milo Boyd (Gerard Butler) handles the situation, and he just happens to be Nicole’s ex-husband. The couple goes through many ups and downs as Milo attempts to bring Nicole to jail and they also deal with a police scandal that she still tries to investigate.

When Hunter hit movie screens this spring, I didn’t pay a lot of attention to it. Although the flick tried to meld romantic comedy with action, it seemed to come down more firmly in the former genre, and it didn’t look like a successful take on the subject. I think the movie earned pretty awful reviews, but it barely registered with me.

Now that I’ve seen it, I can say that while I don’t believe Hunter deserved severe pans, I also won’t claim that it’s a particularly good movie. No, it’s really mediocre – exceedingly, totally, perpetually mediocre. Nothing occurs that makes you turn away in disgust, but nothing happens to actively engage you in the tale either.

On the positive side, I think Butler and Aniston show decent chemistry, though I’m not wild about his take on his character. Butler adopts a broad impersonation of a stereotypical New York cop, and he veers into parody much of the time. Still, Aniston proves to be reasonably charming, so their moments together muster some pleasure.

On the negative side… well, pretty much everything else. The story essentially updates Midnight Run with a divorced couple instead of De Niro and Grodin, and it doesn’t work, mostly because director Andy Tennant can’t connect the disparate elements. Hunter attempts slapstick comedy, romance and action, but it fails to succeed in any of those areas.

The result is an awkward mishmash that never establishes its own personality. It almost feels like filmmaking by committee, as though three different directors handled the various scenes and then someone attempts to make sense of the material.

I think Hunter would’ve worked better as a simple cat and mouse flick. It spends an awful lot of time with the utterly forgettable police scandal plot, and those scenes just bog down the tale. They add no suspense or drama; the dramatic story is too involved to be a simple McGuffin, but it’s too sketchy and ill-realized to intrigue us.

Like I said earlier, I wouldn’t classify Bounty Hunter as an awful movie, as I don’t think it provides an unpleasant experience. I can’t find anything much to endorse about it though. Flicks like this might keep your attention for a short time on a lazy Saturday afternoon, but that’s not much of an endorsement.

The Bounty Hunter appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.35:1 on this single-sided, double-layered DVD; the image has been enhanced for 16X9 televisions. While not bad, the transfer lacked much sparkle.

Sharpness varied. Most shots demonstrated good delineation, but some exceptions occurred. Wide shots tended to be somewhat soft and fuzzy, so they created occasional distractions. No issues with jagged edges or shimmering occurred, but edge enhancement cropped up through the film; I noticed light haloes a fair amount of the time. Other source flaws failed to appear.

Colors looked fairly ordinary. The image took on a golden tone much of the time, but the image stayed with a pretty natural impression. The hues seemed acceptable but they weren’t particularly strong. Blacks appeared reasonably dark and tight, while shadows showed decent delineation; some low-light shots were a bit too thick, though. All of this was good enough for a mediocre “C+”.

I also thought the Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack of Bounty Hunter remained unexceptional. In terms of effects, general ambience ruled the day. Surround usage stayed limited; the back speakers gently fleshed out various settings but did little more than that.

In those forward channels, the music provided nice stereo separation and opened up the mix reasonably well. There wasn’t a whole lot of activity or movement, but the effects conveyed a passable sense of space and place. This was a bit of a disappointment given the action side of the movie. Yes, it’s also a romantic comedy, but it provided a mix of car chase and shoot-out scenes. Those occasionally threw in a nugget from the back channels, but they didn’t add much. This remained a heavily front-oriented track that didn’t contribute much information elsewhere, even when the movie seemed to call for it.

Audio quality appeared fine. Dialogue was consistently warm and natural, though I noticed a little edginess at times. Effects seemed appropriately clean and distinct; while they didn’t get a lot to do, they sounded positive. The music came across as acceptably distinctive. This track lacked the breadth I expected, but it was adequate enough.

Three featurettes fill out the set. Making The Bounty Hunter goes for 17 minutes, 41 seconds and includes comments from producer Neal H. Moritz, director Andy Tennant, executive producer, Ori Marmur, and actors Gerard Butler, Jennifer Aniston, and Jason Sudeikis. “Making” looks at story and characters, how Tennant came onto the project and his work on the set, cast and performances, stunts and action, and other notes from the shoot.

Should you expect anything insightful or memorable here? Not really. We get a few good tidbits, but the show exists to tout the flick. That leaves it fluffy and forgettable.

Stops Along the Road: Hunting Locations lasts 11 minutes, 13 seconds and provides notes from Moritz, Tennant, Marmur, Sudeikis, and production designer Jane Musky. They chat about production design and shooting locations. Some puffery comes along for the ride, but we learn more than a few good facts here.

Finally, the one-minute, 21-second Rules for Outwitting a Bounty Hunter essentially acts as an alternate trailer. It shows movie clips as it offers “rules” connected to the film’s story and characters. It’s a waste of time.

The disc opens with ads for Chloe and The Back-Up Plan. These also appear under Previews along with clips for Get Low, The Runaways, Extraordinary Measures, Nine, Dear John, Drop Dead Diva and The Pillars of the Earth. Not counting the “Rules” featurette I discussed above, no trailer for Hunter shows up here.

Look up “mediocre romantic comedy” and you’ll find an entry for The Bounty Hunter. Never awful but always banal, the film lacks much inspiration. The DVD provides acceptable picture and audio along with minor supplements. Bounty doesn’t do enough right to merit a recommendation as anything other than a date night desperation rental.