Synopsis: Sardonic journalist Sidney Young (Simon Pegg) is sick and tired of being shut out of the celebrity party. Unfortunately, his magazine ‘The Post-Modern Review’ is no-budget, non-professional and going nowhere, leaving him to try and blag his way into post-awards bashes by the most ridiculous of means. When, after one particularly disastrous attempt involving a pig, Sidney is offered a job at New York’s ‘Sharps’ magazine, he eagerly accepts, hoping that his big break has arrived. Put on the celebrity gossip section, will he sink or swim? The title gives a hefty clue there, and he soon makes a name for himself as the magazine’s resident “Idiot Savant, without the Savant”.

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People takes its basis from Toby Young’s memoir of the same name and transposes it onto the basic Hollywood comedy of errors formula, with the typical “stay true to yourself” moral and predictably happy ending. It’s not a reinvention of the wheel – more a Devil Wears Prada with a British male lead. Kirsten Dunst ticks the obligatory “inevitable love interest totty” box as Sidney’s ‘Sharps’ co-worker Alison Olsen, and Danny Huston is the basic sleazy boss. It’s Pegg who takes his role to a whole new level, taking the part of the classic underdog arsehole from the memoir and adding his own loveable spin to it. By the end of the film you’ll be rooting for him despite yourself.

One of the film’s most surprising successes comes in the form of X-Files veteran Gillian Anderson as Eleanor Johnson, the imposingly formidable PR woman for the host of young stars courted by ‘Sharps’. Her fierceness provides a great striking point for Pegg’s buffoonery and underlines the satirical elements at play throughout the film. Up-and-comer Megan Fox is also strikingly apt for the role of Sophie Maes, the in-demand young starlet who forms the object of Sidney’s affections.

Irksome, though, is that although the main characters have hinted-at depths, these are left unexplored. It is mentioned, for example, that Sidney has a solid intellectual background, yet none of this is really shown in his actions and it’s left as just that: a tantalising yet frustrating implication which, if followed through, could satisfactorily round out the character. As a result, some of the characters, particularly Sidney’s immediate superior Lawrence Maddox, feel a little flat.

While fans of Pegg’s previous work may be slightly disappointed by the fact that there’s nothing to match “you’ve got red on you” or “whoah there, pickle!” in terms of quotability, but there are still enough one-liners (particularly in Sidney and Allison’s first encounter in a New York bar) and ingenious slapstick set-ups to keep you laughing. There’s also a binge of cameo appearances in a hilariously chaotic office scene which will satisfy the Britcom buffs. And this is before we even reach the ‘limpy piggy dance’ – I won’t ruin this highlight too much, but trust me when I say that it’s practically worth the cost of the cinema ticket just to see it.

If it’s a fun, easy watch you’re after, How to Lose Friends and Influence People is definitely one to watch, particularly if you’re a fan of either the rom-com genre or Simon Pegg. And if you just want to see a grown man dancing like a limpy piggy?