Ben Stiller stars as a suburbanite who becomes consumed by the title emotion after his best friend and next-door neighbor (Jack Black) strikes it rich with a spray that makes dog shit disappear. It’s easy to see why this uneven farce, directed by Barry Levinson from a script by Steve Adams, has been shelved for so long: any comedy that depends on dog shitor on literally beating a dead horsefor many of its laughs is already in serious trouble. I tend to enjoy Jack Black as a kind of updated Jack Carson, and Christopher Walken does some lively overacting as a crazed bohemian named J-Man. But Rachel Weisz and Amy Poehler, as the heroes’ wives, are distinctly out of their element, and Stiller is even more boring than usual. With so many dubious elements at play, even the half-good ideas get lost in the shuffle. PG-13, 99 min. (JR)