Movie Review The Meyerowitz Stories

The Meyerowitz Stories (2017) 

Directed by Noah Baumbach 

Written by Noah Baumbach 

Starring Ben Stiller, Adam Sandler, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, Elizabeth Marvel

Release Date October 14th, 2017 

My friends and fellow podcasters on the "Everyone is a Critic" podcast like to joke about my disdain for Adam Sandler. They seem to believe that I harbor some personal grudge against the man. It’s not true but it makes for a funny running gag. In reality, I have a professional grudge against Adam Sandler, nothing personal. I am professionally irritated by Adam Sandler because he continually works so far below his talent.

That’s right, I believe Adam Sandler is talented. In fact, I believe Adam Sandler is remarkably talented. Unfortunately, he chooses to abandon his gifts in favor of a steady, high dollar paycheck and the chance to goof off with his friends. It’s irritating to me as a critic to watch a man I know can act pretending that he can’t. Make no mistake, Adam Sandler can act. When he works with a real director, one with vision and the ability to bend Sandler to his or her will, Sandler can deliver a genuine powerhouse performance. His new film, under the direction of Noah Baumbach, The Meyerowitz Stories, reinforces my point.

In The Meyerowitz Stories, Adam Sandler plays Danny, a single father to a college-bound daughter, Eliza (Grace Van Patten), and the son a respected sculptor and professor, Harold Meyerowitz (Dustin Hoffman). Danny has a wonderful relationship with his daughter and a terribly fraught relationship with his father. Unfortunately for him, Eliza is leaving for college and having recently broken up with Eliza’s mother, Danny is going to stay with his dad and dad’s flighty gal-pal Maureen (Emma Thompson).

Danny has a sister named Jean (Elizabeth Marvel) and a half-brother, Matthew (Ben Stiller), whom his father adores and can’t resist mentioning in front of Danny. Where Danny has never had a job, he was essentially a house husband and father after abandoning his musical aspirations, Matthew has moved to Los Angeles and become a successful financial advisor to celebrities. That Matthew left to escape their father, is something Harold ignores, and Danny is unaware of.

Find my full length review in the Geeks Community on Vocal 

Classic Movie Review Coneheads

Coneheads (1993)

Directed by Steve Barron

Written by Tom Davis, Dan Akroyd, Bonnie Turner, Terry Turner 

Starring Dan Akroyd, Jane Curtin, Chris Farley, Adam Sandler, Phil Hartman, Sinbad, Michelle Burke 

Release Date July 23rd, 2023 

Published August 30th, 2023 

Am I more mature or less fun? It's a sad question that I was forced to confront as I sat through another movie from my youth that was not nearly as much fun as I remembered. Coneheads is an utterly dreadful movie. When I was a teenager, with a heavy nostalgia for the glory years of SNL that, admittedly, I had only experienced via reruns, I liked Coneheads The Movie. As I once said in a column on this very website, linked here, movies don't change, you do. That's very clear to me after watching Coneheads for what I thought would be a nostalgic look back at a cult favorite. 

Coneheads began life as a popular running sketch on SNL in the late 1970s. Beldar and Prymaat Conehead (Dan Akroyd and Jane Curtin), are aliens from the planet Remulak who are hiding out on Earth and trying to cover up the fact that they are very obviously aliens. They have giant cone shaped heads and they speak in a staccato monotone, like some kind of robot affecting a human voice. That's the joke, the juxtaposition of the attempts by Beldar and Prymaat to seem like suburban Americans versus the tension of them obviously being aliens. 

It's a great sketch premise. I imagine that it is a premise that Dan Akroyd had in mind for many years before he got his big break on SNL. It has the feel of something improvised on stage at Groundlings or Second City show. On SNL that improvised vibe fueled the 5 to 6 minute sketches with one character entering the world of the Coneheads and obliviously accepting the premise that these are normal suburban parents or someone growing more and more frustrated in their attempt to prove that they are aliens. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review Just Go With It

Just Go With It (2011) 

Directed by Dennis Dugan 

Written by Alan Loeb, Timothy Dowling 

Starring Adam Sandler, Brooklyn Decker, Jennifer Aniston, Nick Swardson 

Release Date February 11th, 2011 

Published February 11th, 2011 

Adam Sandler has given up. The star of “Just Go With It” simply isn't trying anymore. Having sussed out that his fans will attend any trip he slaps his name on, Sandler is now giving his fans the effort they deserve. If they are not going to ask for anything more than a few moments of him barking like a dog or a friend of his humping something, why should he offer anything more than a minimum effort?

In “Just Go With It” Sandler plays Danny, a plastic surgeon who got dumped on his wedding night some 20 years ago and found out that night that his now useless wedding ring was somehow an aphrodisiac. Thus, he has spent the past two decades wearing the ring, telling stories of being abused by his wife and bedding bimbo after foolish bimbo.

And then Danny met Palmer (Sports Illustrated model Brooklyn Decker), a fourth grade teacher who happens to meet him when he's not wearing his fake ring. The two hit it off but when she accidentally happens upon the ring she wants nothing to do with him. What's Danny to do but lie about getting a divorce in order to win her back? Unfortunately, Palmer insists on meeting the soon to be ex-Mrs. Danny.

With nowhere to turn, Danny calls on his assistant Katherine (Jennifer Aniston) to be the fake wife who will give her blessing to his new relationship. How these three along with Katherine's two kids and Danny's idiot cousin Eddy end up in Hawaii I will leave you to discover should you willingly waste the price of a ticket and nearly two hours of your precious life on “Just Go With It.”

My theory is that when “Grown Ups” became Sandler's highest grossing domestic feature it finally hit him that he no longer had to try. Heck, “Grown Ups” was just him goofing off with his pals and people paid millions to watch, clearly he doesn't have to work hard ever again. To test the theory Sandler along with his pal and favored director Dennis Dugan decided to take a Hawaiian vacation on a studio dime and film it just to see if people would watch him on a vacation.

Are there jokes in “Just Go With It?” Yes, I think they are intended as jokes but just to demonstrate the effort on display twice in the film Sandler simply barks like a dog as a punch line to a scene. TWICE! The old standbys are there as well including vague, shrugged shouldered homophobia and slight bestiality because what would a Sandler movie be without someone humping something.

Jennifer Aniston didn't merely get a vacation out of “Just Go With It,” in one pointless scene she gets a brand new wardrobe, one I wouldn't be surprised went home with her for real and why not the whole production was an excuse for a free trip to Hawaii why shouldn't she get a wardrobe in the deal.

Here's hoping Nicole Kidman, who has an awful cameo as an ex college rival of Aniston's Katherine, got something more out of “Just Go With It” than damage to her Oscar chances a la Eddie Murphy in “Norbit.” Kidman and poor Dave Matthews are saddled with such moronic characters that it’s fair to wonder if Sandler and Dugan really didn’t like them very much.  

Someone once said 'You only get what you give.' You gave Sandler millions just to watch him and his friends pee in a pool in “Grown Ups” so you can't be surprised that all he gives you in “Just Go With It” is a glimpse of his fabulous multimillion dollar Hawaiian vacation with Brooklyn Decker and Jennifer Aniston. Keep it up and his next movie will just be him in his living room watching old episodes of SNL with Scarlett Johansson as the girl who delivers his pizza.

Movie Review: Uncut Gems

Uncut Gems (2019) 

Directed by The Safdie Brothers

Written by The Safdie Brothers

Starring Adam Sandler, Kevin Garnett, Eric Bogosian

Release Date December 13th, 2019 

Published December 10th, 2019 

I am not a fan of the work of Adam Sandler. I find Sandler’s brand of lowbrow comedy to be like the proverbial nails on a chalkboard. Sandler has made movies so terrible that they still haunt my nightmares, Jack and Jill. This is all to say that when I hear Adam Sandler is starring in a movie, I assume the worst and look to avoid it, something that Sandler’s deal with Netflix has made easier for me as a critic of theatrical features. 

So it was with great trepidation that I approached Adam Sandler’s new movie, Uncut Gems. On the one hand, reviews for this drama from indie darling filmmakers, Josh and Benny Safdie, have been phenomenal. On the other hand… it’s Sandler, I have a right to my cynicism. What a surprise then to find that not only is Sandler not blindingly terrible in Uncut Gems, he may be downright Oscar-worthy. 

Uncut Gems stars Adam Sandler as Howard Ratner, a high end, New York City jewelry store owner whose life moves at a rapid and relentless clip. Howard is in debt to everyone because he can’t resist getting to the next big score. This could be a piece of high end jewelry or a big bet parlay on a sporting event. Whatever that next big thing is, Howard is drawn to it like a moth to a flame, only even more flammable. 

Howard’s latest big score is an uncut gem that he’s acquired through nefarious means. The gem was stolen from a diamond mine in Ethiopia where the diamond trade is a literally cutthroat business at times. Somehow, Howard convinced some locals to give him the uncut gem for an insanely low price and smuggle it to him at the penalty of their own death had they been caught. For them, they stand to gain a couple thousand dollars. Howard, however, believes the gem is worth more than a million. 

Howard being Howard however, he can’t resist risking his big new investment. First he decides to show it off when NBA star Kevin Garnett drops by his store. Then, out of ungodly hubris, he let’s KG take the gem for a night while Howard holds and subsequently, secretly pawn’s KG’s NBA championship ring. Howard takes that money and bets it on a parlay, a three prong wager on KG’s scoring, rebounding and the Celtics winning. 

That’s just the furious first act of Uncut Gems which roils and simmers and boils with plot developments, rarely slowing to catch a breath. 

After years of selling short his own talent, Adam Sandler has found the role of a lifetime in Howard. The character is a perfect distillation of the best of Sandler’s manic, angry, energy. Usually, Sandler is as boring and listless as his moves are tasteless and unfunny. Here, however, with a pair of visionary directors at the helm and a juicy character to play, Sandler is violently alive with energy and excitement shooting from his eyeballs. 

This is a tour de force performance made all the more impressive for lack of strong supporting performances. That’s not a knock on Lakeith Stanfield, Idina Menzel or Julia Fox who make up the top supporting players in this story, they appear to be intentionally underwritten and portrayed specifically to act as bounders for Sandler’s pinball performance. Arguably, the most impactful supporting performance from basketball legend Kevin Garnett whose growing obsession with the gem nearly matches Howard’s. 

Uncut Gems was written and directed by the Safdie Brothers, Josh and Benny. The Safdies became the darlings of the indie film world with their 2017 crime drama Good Time. I found Good Time to be visually dynamic but too repetitive. But, like Uncut Gems, that Good Time hummed with life and energy. The Safdie’s are really great at building tension in their narrative and not allowing that tension to ease until the very end. 

In Uncut Gems that is an absolutely perfect approach. The ending of Uncut Gems is breathtakingly on point. There is no other way for this movie to end and the ending is a gut shot. I won’t spoil anything of the ending, just give yourself over to the high intensity of Sandler and the low, simmering, violent rage of his nemesis, Arno, magnificently played in small bursts by Eric Bogosian, and you too will find this ending to be one of incredibly powerful catharsis. To say more is to say too much.  

Uncut Gems is extraordinary. 

Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation

Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation (2018) 

Directed by Genndy Tartakovsky

Written by Michael McCullers, Genndy Tartakovsky

Starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Andy Samberg, David Spade, Selena Gomez

Release Date July 13th, 2018

Published July 14th, 2018

Hotel Transylvania Summer Vacation is the third and least offensive of this trilogy of Adam Sandler starring animated comedies. I wasn’t a fan of the first two Hotel Transylvania movies which felt, to me, too scatological, like a sanitized version of what Sandler does in his live action work. This time, however, with the franchise leaving the titular hotel there is something of a different feel to everything and for the first time, I laughed out loud more than once watching a Hotel Transylvania movie. 

Hotel Transylvania Summer Vacation finds our hero Drac (Sandler) lonely. Sure, he has a loving family and great friends but he wants a companion and at the same time feels guilty for wanting one for the first time since the death of his wife. Drac’s daughter Mavis meanwhile, mistakes his loneliness for stress and comes up with a solution, a dream cruise to the Bermuda Triangle. The whole family is going including Frank (Kevin James), Griffin the Invisible Man (David Spade), Murray the Mummy (Keegan Michael Key) and Wayne the Wolf and his wife Wanda and ALL of their kids. 

While Drac appreciates his daughter’s effort a cruise for a hotel owner feels rather redundant but things pick up when he Drac meets the Captain of the Cruise ship, Ericka (Kathryn Hahn). Drac is immediately smitten and I must say, the scenes with Drac overcome with feelings on meeting Ericka is very cute and it made me smile. The follow up scene in which an over-confident Drac struts around the ship to Bruno Mars’ “24 Karat Magic” is delightful with a funny if not all that original payoff. 

So, we have a love story on our hands and that means we need obstacles and this movie has a pretty good one. Ericka has a secret, the cruise is a sham and she has set it up so she can get revenge on Drac. You see, Ericka is Ericka Van Helsing, of the vampire-killing Van Helsings. She’s trained her whole life to kill Drac. Her great-grandfather Van Helsing (Jim Gaffigan) has stayed alive long past a normal lifespan, just to see his granddaughter vanquish Drac as he had failed to. 

That’s a pretty clever conflict, I gotta admit, I really liked that. The first film played a similar conflict with Andy Samberg’s human falling for Selena Gomez’ vampire but that was somehow far less fun than this. This film seems to delight a little more in the conflict as Drac is the one who is unaware of the danger he’s in. I really enjoyed the romantic sequence of Drac repeatedly saving Ericka while she’s attempting to recover a weapon she intends to kill him with. She begins to fall for him and yet she’s torn. It’s just clever enough to be amusing. 

My favorite gag in Hotel Transylvania could not be more simple. It’s a flashback to Van Helsing attempting to capture Drac and his friends on a train. We see Van Helsing enter, we know the monsters are hidden at the front of the car. We see Van Helsing pull out a box of matches, the tension builds because we know what’s coming, we know from the other movies how Frank reacts to fire. When Van Helsing lights the match, Frank freaks out and the scene and the movie are off and running. There’s nothing special here, but the simplicity made me laugh. 

Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation is nothing special, it’s certainly not a Pixar quality work. This isn’t art but for a shallow kiddie flick, it’s pretty good. It made me laugh at these monster characters for the first time in the entire franchise so that’s something. Having low expectations certainly helped matters. But there is something more genuine and winning about this outing in the Hotel Transylvania franchise. Something slightly more clever and less lowest common denominator. Whatever the reason, I enjoyed it enough to say this one is worth seeing. 

Movie Review Bedtime Stories

Bedtime Stories (2008) 

Directed by Adam Shankman

Written by Tim Herlihy, Matt Lopez

Starring Adam Sandler, Courtney Cox, Guy Pearce, Russell Brand, Jonathan Pryce

Release Date December 25th, 2008

Published Decemer 24th, 2008

Oh what a shock! Sean hates an Adam Sandler movie. Stop the presses. Well, now wait a second. I was developing a grudging affinity for the former SNL star. I liked Punch Drunk Love. I thought he was tremendous in the terribly flawed movie Reign Over Me. And, I even liked You Don't Mess With The Zohan for the sheer glee of its offensiveness.

I honestly thought that Sandler was maturing and recognizing that even the most outlandish story, such as Zohan, needed some dramatic parameters. I thought maybe that he was developing a knowledge of how to build believable characters and motivations. And I thought maybe his juvenilia was evolving a little.

Oh how wrong I was. Bedtime Stories is the lowest piece of garbage that Sandler has crafted since Billy Madison. Insulting, stupid, beyond juvenile, this alleged 'family' movie from Disney of all places, ranks among the lowest moments of Sandler's already low career.

Bedtime Stories stars Sandler as Skeeter, a hotel handyman who had grown up in the hotel business. His father played by Jonathan Pryce, who also narrates the movie, once owned the hotel and lived their with his son and his daughter played by Courtney Cox.

Dad passed away not long after he had sold the hotel to a hotelier played by Richard Griffiths. He turned the tiny hotel into a massive hotel palace and kept Skeeter on as a handyman for some 20 years. Now he is about to open a new hotel and Skeeter hopes to run it.

Meanwhile, Skeeter's sis has lost her job and must travel out of state for a job interview. She needs little brother to watch her two kids for a week despite his having not seen them in four years. Nevertheless, he accepts. Each night at bedtime they require a story and for some unknown reason portions of the stories come to life the following day.

The script for Bedtime Stories was apparently penned on the back of a cocktail napkin. It read "Children's Bedtime stories come to life starring Adam Sandler". The rest of the production involved hiring a cast and director who would simply make up everything else that happens.

Nevermind if any of it connects into some coherent story or if the characters motivation or even their dialogue makes a lick of sense, we've got Adam Sandler and a premise, that's all the filmmakers felt they needed. Oh, how wrong they were.

What the cast and director Adam Shankman invented around this premise was brutal, unending stupidity. True garbage. None of the characters make any sense. Plot strands arrive and then are shoved off screen maybe to be revisited later. Characters are introduced and quickly dispatched without making a lick of difference to the story.

I realize that I am not supposed to care whether Skeeter would be at all qualified to run a hotel, it's not necessary information, but as presented I would not allow Skeeter to run a gas pump. Kids will not care that they are being insulted by such plot insinuations but I was endlessly irritated with the lack of care that anyone from Sandler to the director to the producers took with this plot construction.

But again, this is a kids movie you say. Why does it matter. The kids will love the bright colors and the googly eyed, farting guinea pig. They'll eat it up. Well, I will tell you why it matters. Because kids should not eat this up. Kids should not be subjected to such shoddy work.

Director Shankman's work is sloppy at best and Sandler hasn't been this lazy on screen since Mr. Deeds. Kids deserve better. They may not know it but they deserve better than to simply have their senses tickled. They deserve better than bright colors and fart jokes from a slipshod director and lazy superstar who do their jobs on autopilot why? Because it's just a kiddie flick.

No, kids deserve better. Kids deserve movies that don't patronize and appeal to their lower minds. Kids deserve movies that challenge them to think and imagine. They need and I believe they crave movies that expand their minds and make them think of bigger and better things.

Movies like Wall-E and Horton Hears A Who and Kung Fu Panda have been released this year and each of these animated features have entertained kids and caused their imaginations and intellects to expand. Kids came out of those movies laughing and smiling and best of all dreaming.

Bedtime Stories may occasionally make them laugh or smile but it won't make them dream. It will stifle them. They may not know it or show it but they will feel short changed. They will instinctively know that their time and their imagination has been wasted and the long term effect will be for them to expect less of movies.

The long term effect will be felt when years later they expect nothing of the movies and of art but the base visceral need for a distraction from daily life and that is a sad end. I know you will say I am overreacting and that Bedtime Stories is a mere trifle of a movie that will be long forgotten by most in less than a week but I am telling you, your wrong.

Bedtime Stories is an affliction. It is a long term damaging of the psyche. A movie whose future effect will be to lower the standards of what children expect of art and what they think is expected of them as people. If you care so little what you use to stimulate your child they will come to expect less of their own stimulation.

Bedtime Stories is the worst movie of 2008.

Movie Review: You Don't Mess with the Zohan

You Don't Mess with the Zohan (2008) 

Directed by Dennis Dugan

Written by Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow, Robert Smigel

Starring Adam Sandler, Emmanuel Chriqui, Rob Schneider, Lainie Kazan

Release Date June 6th, 2008

Published June 6th, 2008

It's strange to think of Adam Sandler and societal relevance. And yet, when you look back on his recent career it's difficult to miss a sort of ripped from the headlines quality to his resume. In Reign Over Me Sandler tackled post 9/11 grieving. In I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry it was gay marriage. Now with his latest Summer blockbuster Sandler takes on the middle east, specifically the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and does so with the kind of irreverence and all encompassing bad taste that leaves everyone offended and everyone laughing all at once.

In You Don't Mess With the Zohan Sandler plays 'The Zohan' an ex-Israeli secret police agent who gives up war with Palestine in favor of New York City and the opportunity to become a hairdresser. Taking a job in a neighborhood where Jews and Palestinians live in peace with one another, the Zohan finds himself not just working for a Palestinian, Deliah (Emanuel Chiriqi), but falling in love with her.

Things get dangerous for the Zohan however when a former Palestinian foe, now a cabdriver (Rob Schneider) recognizes him and decides to kill him. The cabby eventually calls on the Zohan's former enemy 'The Phantom' to do the job. The real enemy however is a developer (Michael 'Are You Ready to Rumble' Buffer) who wants the property occupied by Israelis and Palestinians and hires a group of rednecks, lead by James (rocker Dave Matthews), to burn the community to ground and get the two sides to blame each other for the fire.

The plot is more cohesive than the usual Sandler collection of gags, likely due to the influence of current comedy top dog Judd Apatow who joins forces with Sandler and director Dennis Dugan on a script that does slightly more than exist to allow for Sandler's many physical gags and gay jokes. There is an earnest and honest attempt at a message of peace and love for Israelis and Palestinians even as the film offers stunningly offensive caricatures of each. The filmmakers take the perspective that as long as everyone is offended no one is offended and the approach kinda works.

As resistant as I was for much of the Zohan's antics I did find myself laughing loudly more than I ever imagined. Yes, the gay jokes get old and offensive real fast. Yes, watching the Zohan make his name early on in the New York scenes by banging old ladies is utterly horrifying. Nevertheless, you laugh and in a comedy can you really ask much more? And with the Zohan striving for uplift in such an honest fashion, it's hard to dislike and indeed not admire the efforts of the Zohan.

Adam Sandler isn't about to solve the middle east crisis but he seems to care and that is something from the man who was The Waterboy and Little Nicky.

Movie Review Grown Ups

Grown Ups (2010) 

Directed by Dennis Dugan

Written by Adam Sandler, Fred Wolf

Starring Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, David Spade, Rob Schneider, Kevin James, Taylor Lautner

Release Date June 25th, 2010 

Published June 24th, 2010

Critics, like me, can decry the Adam Sandler brand of comedy all day. We do, we will, I will. But, we cannot deny its continuing success. Sandler is, arguably, the safest business bet in all of Hollywood. Even at his worst in garbage like “Bedtime Stories,” the worst film of 2008, bar none, Sandler still turns out his fans and returns on studio investments. That will not change with the release of “Grown Ups.” This thin excuse for Sandler to get his oldest friends together for a lakeside working vacation is exceptionally typical of the Sandler brand: dog doo, passing gas and copious pratfalls. It's not filmic poetry but fans of the brand do not care.

In “Grown Ups” Adam Sandler is Lenny, a 40-something Hollywood Agent married to a sexy fashion designer (Salma Hayek) and raising three spoiled kids who text their nanny to bring them things ,and spend most of their time in front of a flat screen TV. Lenny laments his children's lack of imagination but does little to change them. That is until Lenny is shocked out of his rich boy Hollywood idyll by the death of his childhood mentor and basketball coach, Coach Buzzer (Comic and Sandler crony Blake Clark).

Gathering up his wife and brats, Lenny is headed home to a lakeside retreat to meet his old pals and former teammates. There's Eric (Kevin James), the chubby one, whose wife (Maria Bello) is still breastfeeding their 4-year-old son.

Kurt (Chris Rock), a henpecked house husband under the thumb of his pregnant wife (Maya Rudolf). There is Marcus (David Spade), the single and loving ladies man. And finally there is Rob, a dopey thrice divorced vegan spiritualist married to a much, much, much older woman (Joyce Van Patten).

Beyond these minor character quirks there really is nothing to any of these characters. In the course of “Grown Ups” none of these characters evolve, deepen or expand our understanding of them. Sure, each is given an issue to play, like Sandler and his tech-obsessed brats, but each of these issues is resolved with little, if any, dramatic effort.

Like most Adam Sandler comedies, “Grown Ups” is an idea in search of a story or unifying theme that settles for being a series of occasionally funny gags and one liners. Sandler and his company Happy Madison don't so much develop screenplays really; rather, they come up with ideas, grab a camera and hope that something will come together in editing.

Nothing much comes together in “Grown Ups.” David Spade gets in a few good jabs. Kevin James falls down funny once or twice. Rob Schneider has a bit with an arrow that earns a chuckle but the good gags are few and far between. More often you get a lot of dead space in which the gang riffs in search of a punchline, often never finding it and allowing a scene to simply end awkwardly and unfunny.

None of my criticism of “Grown Ups” will matter to the Sandler cult. There is poo, there are multiple farts and the chubby guy, James, falls down funny. That's all the Sandler fan asks for and that is all that “Grown Ups delivers.” Success, it seems, is a highly subjective concept.

Movie Review I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry

I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry (2007) 

Directed by Dennis Dugan 

Written by Barry Fanaro, Alexander Payne, Jim Taylor 

Starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Jessica Biel, Ving Rhames, Steve Buscemi, Dan Akroyd

Release Date July 20th, 2007

Published July 20th, 2007

For every little bit of progress Adam Sandler makes as an actor; he seems to take one step back. His performance earlier this year in the 9/11 drama Reign Over Me was a tremendous step forward for Sandler as an actor, if a bit of a step down from his usual box office stature. Like his very impressive turn in P.T Anderson's Punch Drunk Love which Sandler followed with the juvenile animated effort 8 Crazy Nights and the dull, unfunny rage of Anger Management, Sandler chooses to follow Reign Over Me with the childish attempt at P.C laughs in stereotypical clothes, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry.

Larry Valentine has a big problem. As a firefighter who rushes into the blaze to save lives, his life is often on the line. His work is very dangerous and with two kids at home to take care of, Larry wants to make sure they get his pension should something happen to him. Unfortunately, a paperwork snafu, in the wake of his wife's untimely death, has left Larry in a real bind. Should he be killed in action, his kids won't get his pension unless he gets married.

Unfortunately for Larry, there is only one person he would trust enough to make sure his kids were taken care of. his lifelong pal, Chuck Levine. This is where Larry crafts a real hairbrained scheme. Seeing a story in the paper about how the city of New York has legalized domestic partnerships for gay couples, Larry gets the idea to marry his pal Chuck.

Chuck is not exactly the ideal choice for this scam. He has a rather legendary reputation as a ladies man. In fact, when we first meet Chuck a pair of sexy twin sisters are fighting over him after he slept with both of them. Later, when Larry goes to tell Chuck his plan, he interrupts him while he is romancing several women at the same time.

Nevertheless, Chuck owes Larry his life after a fire call went bad, so he agrees and the two head for Canada to make it legal. Things get complicated when the city challenges the authenticity of their relationship and Larry hires a sexy lawyer named Alex (Jessica Biel) who immediately strikes a chord with Chuck and puts the whole scheme on thin ice.

This being a typical, brainless Adam Sandler effort you expect and get just about every stereotype known to man thrown in as comic asides. However, surprisingly enough, the biggest problem with I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry is not insensitivity, the film actually offers a pro gay agenda. Rather, the problem is much simpler than that. It's just not a very well made movie.

Directed by Adam Sandler's pet director Dennis Dugan (Big Daddy, Happy Gilmore), I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry never establishes a solid tone or any kind of charm. The film is crude and resorts more often to dull slapstick than to anything organically plot driven. The plot should be the focus, it's a big broad topic with many opportunities for satire. That, sadly, is well beyond the intellectual scope of Dugan and Sandler.

While there will be many who will be offended by the many stereotypes at use in I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, you will be surprised how fairminded and pro gay the film really is. Though the support is shallow because of the gutless direction of Dennis Dugan and the strip mined script by Sandler and Barry Fanaro, the film's heart is in the right place.

What really stinks is that you can see the potential for something a little more thoughtful, deeper and more satisfying. Jim Taylor and Alexander Payne, the team behind Election, About Schmidt and Sideways, delivered a version of this script that, those who have read it, say is sharper and more pointed in its humor and perspective. That version was flamed in favor of a more Sandler friendly version with all of the slapstick and self serving ego indulgences that are Sandler's hallmarks.

My biggest fear was that I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry would be a series of stereotypical jokes with a liberal use of the word f****t. Watching it, that is what we get. However, a heavy dose of positivity manages to balance things out in a very surprising way. That positive feeling however, is not enough to make the film funnier than it is or more believable than it is.

I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry suffers the ego of its star Adam Sandler who compromises much of what might have worked in the film in favor of fellating his own ego. What a shame, there was a good deal of potential here.

Movie Review: Click

Click (2006) 

Directed by Frank Coraci 

Written by Steve Koren, Mark O'Keefe

Starring Adam Sandler, Christopher Walken, Kate Beckinsale, David Hasselhoff 

Release Date June 23rd, 2006 

Published June 22nd, 2006 

Adam Sandler and Frank Coraci have worked together enough to have developed an assembly line approach to their work. From The Wedding Singer, to The Waterboy and now Click they have developed a certain formula to their work that is undeniably popular with the Sandler cult but has grown more than wearying for the rest of us.

The sad thing about their latest teaming, Click, is that such a promising idea gets chewed up and spit out in the Sandler-Coraci assembly line; turning a clever high concept into just another lowbrow Sandler disappointment.

Adam Sandler stars in Click as Michael Newman; a harried architect whose main focus in life is success. Feeling that being highly successful in his career will someday earn him the time he needs to spend with his family, Michael ignores his family in order to provide for them. His wife Donna (Kate Beckinsale) is rather clueless to Michael's need for success and her constant nagging about spending time with the family is Michael's main source of stress, outside of work.

One night when Michael actually gets a few moments of peace and intends to watch a little TV he finds that there are so many remote controls in the room he can't even turn on the TV let alone watch. This leads to a trip to Bed Bath & Beyond (in the ultimate bit of brand placement), and a trip to the Beyond section where a wild haired scientist named Morty (a perfectly cast Christopher Walken) sets Michael up with the ultimate universal remote control.

Once home with his new remote Michael slowly discovers its amazing abilities. The mute button can mute real sounds, like the dog barking or his kids screaming. The pause button can stop time and coolest of all the fast forward button allows Michael to skip those moments of his life that are keeping him from getting his work done.

Unfortunately for Michael he did not realize that he is in the comic version of a Twilight Zone episode. He doesn't realize that such a gift has to come with certain flaws and drawbacks. After fast forwarding through everything from getting ready for work in the morning to fights with his wife to even sex with his wife, Michael finds the remote jumping ahead for him. Like setting the preferences on a TIVO the remote learns and assumes Michael's preferences and soon large chunks of his life have passed unknown to him.

Click has a killer premise that Sandler and director Frank Coraci fumble miserably because of their slavish devotion to the juvenile behavior that made them so successful and an inability to really dig beneath the surface of this potentially fascinating idea. They seem to understand that they have a great idea but beyond that they have no interest in or no idea how to dig into it.

Click spends it's first two acts showing us the various little things that the remote can do, like Sandler using the color mapping to turn himself into The Hulk, or stopping time so his son can get revenge on a nasty little kid. Then in the third act, once it's revealed what the dangers of the remote are, rather than dig deeply into the sad, inherently tragic elements of this device; the film simply turns maudlin. Sandler and Coraci imitate depth without ever achieving it.

The comic potential of Click is at times well realized. The scenes in which Christopher Walken as the wacky scientist explains the various features of the remote are very clever, especially the commentary feature with James Earl Jones (though nowadays Morgan Freeman would be the funnier reference). I also loved the trip back through Michael's life as Walken explains the rewind function. Sandler's exaggerated response to watching his birth and conception are terrifically funny moments in an otherwise laugh free film.

Christopher Walken nearly steals the picture as the wacky professor. Though he does not get one of his classic oddball monologues, Walken still manages to be Walken-esque. With the wild hair and wilder eyes, Walken, along with Sandler veteran Henry Winkler as Michael's dad, seem to be the only actors really having fun with this material.

If someone can tell me why Kate Beckinsale was cast in this film, aside from her obvious beauty, you are a better man than I. Beckinsale's role is barely more than a cameo. When Sandler's Michael isn't fast forwarding through their time together; she is relegated to the role of the whining wife belaboring the point that Michael is never home and is abandoning his family. Beckinsale is far too talented and far too interesting for such a minor role.

One of the biggest problems I have with Click is likely something that Sandler fans were perfectly satisfied with. That is Sandler and Coraci's inescapable need for juvenile bathroom humor. As in every Sandler film you have a dog that humps everything, actually this time I believe it's more than one, and in another scene Sandler can't help but stop time so he can jump on his boss's desk and fart in his face.

Oh, did I mention that the boss is played by David Hasselhoff, something Sandler and Coraci seem to believe is funny simply because he's David Hasselhoff.

Then, in the third act, the film wants to be credibly dramatic. Are you kidding me! How am I supposed to feel sympathy, empathy or even pity for such a wretched character and such a wretchedly juvenile picture. Click simply asks far more of an audience than anyone, save the Sandler cult, is likely willing to give.

What a waste. A smart concept in the hands of a pair of lowbrow millionaires, Click is a sad waste of time and talent, atleast the talents of Beckinsale and Walken. The lowbrow aesthete of Click is perfectly suited to Sandler who seems content to waste his gifts on dogs humping and fart jokes. It's a shame he had to waste this terrific idea for a movie with him.

Movie Review Reign Over Me

Reign Over Me (2007) 

Directed by Mike Binder

Written by Mike Binder

Starring Adam Sandler, Don Cheadle, Jada Pinkett-Smith, Liv Tyler, Saffron Burrows, Donald Sutherland

Release Date March 23rd, 2007

Published March 22nd, 2007

I've never been a fan of Adam Sandler's big screen work. If Will Ferrell's work sometimes feels like a series of SNL skits, Sandler's work is like Mad TV in comparison. Jokes so obvious that the audience chuckles before the punchline, dirty sight gags that only Sandler and his team hangers on find funny, and story's so blindingly dumb that you lose IQ points watching them unfold, Sandler is the ultimate in movie flotsam, for the most part.

However, after his turn in P.T Anderson's wonderfully quirky Punch Drunk Love, I was forced to admit that, when he is directed, Sandler has some real talent. Now with his turn as a 9/11 widowed husband in Reign Over Me; I am forced to once again reconsider Sandler and his talent. As the only good thing in an otherwise shallow wasteland of male midlife whining, Sandler manages to steal the show from none other than Oscar nominee Don Cheadle. Impressive, if you're also an award winning actor, mind blowing if you are Mr. Sandler.

Allen Johnson's (Don Cheadle) life has grown stagnant. Every night is spent at home with his loving wife Janeane (Jada Pinkett Smith) and everyday spent in the office of his quiet dental practice which, though he started it, has begun to treat him as just another employee. Allen's boring life gets a charge of excitement from two very strange sources.

Driving down the street one day Allen sees his old college roommate Charlie Fineman (Adam Sandler). Though Charlie is so scattered that he seems not to remember Allen the two decide to get some coffee and soon they are spending a lot of time together. Charlie was once just like Allen, only happier. He had a beautiful wife and 3 daughters. Sadly, Charlie's family died in one of the planes that hit the world trade center. Since then Charlie has receded into a childish fantasy world of rock music and video games.

The other source of chaos in Allen's life is a wacky dental patient named Donna (Saffron Burrows). She arrives in his office asking about a cosmetic procedure though there is nothing wrong with her teeth. Soon she is offering Allen no strings attached oral sex. When Allen rebuffs her advances, she sues him and yet still wants him as her dentist. If you guessed that she and Charlie will eventually cross paths, well you are not as psychic as you are a student of plot mechanics.

Reign Over Me is the latest aimless, masturbatory exercise in arrested development from writer-director Mike Binder whose scattershot resume includes the exceptional drama The Upside of Anger and the brutal TV series The Mind of the Married Man. Binder is funny and sometimes very insightful. He's also full of shit, navel-gazing, meathead who can't seem to grow up.

Reign Over Me falls somewhere in the middle of Binder's oeuvre. It's at times quite full of shit and at times; honest and insightful. The most truth comes in the pain etched in the performance of Adam Sandler who doesn't so much shed his well worn comic fratboy persona as temper that persona with deep sadness and desperation.

Sandler makes the material work and pulls the character of Charlie away from the grandstanding grief monster written by Binder and into truer, more thoughtful territory. Sandler's own history with arrested development, perpetual child types actually serves him well in giving depth to Charlie. When we see the ways in which Charlie has regressed, with video games and his obsession with the music of his youth, it's very easy to follow Sandler into this territory.

Where the full of shit aspects of Reign Over Me come into play are in any scenes featuring women. Binder does a poor job of writing realistic women and though Liv Tyler and Jada Pinkett Smith struggle to try and give depth to their poorly written characters, they are undone by Binder and his boys club mentality. That ludicrous Binder mentality is especially on display in the character of Donna played by model and actress Saffron Burrows.

Burrows plays a mentally unstable woman who expresses her insecurity and instability by offering oral sex to Cheadle's Allen. She then irrationally sues him but wishes to retain his dental services and again offers sex. Why does this character exist? What does she bring to Allen's journey in the film? These questions are unanswerable, though the explanation could be Binder's inability to avoid shoehorning sex jokes into a film that is lacking them.

What's good about Reign Over Me is Adam Sandler's nuanced and affecting performance. Sandler hasn't been this good since his quirky, oddball performance in Punch Drunk Love, a film that grows more maligned by every Sandler performance. Punch Drunk Sandler and Reign's Sandler have a great deal in common. They are socially inept, damaged souls seeking something bigger than themselves but emotionally stunted to their very soul.

Reign Over Me Sandler is edgy and daring, willing to risk audience sympathies with his rash, childish outbursts and more daringly by allowing the film to use this character to exploit the sadness of 9/11. This is where Sandler truly shines. In a lesser performance writer-director Mike Binder's grandstanding would seem shallow and callous. Sandler makes it work by establishing the grandiose, over the top sadness of this character that carries over the terrific scene where he breaks down.

The rest of Reign Over Me is just another full of shit episode of Binder's former TV show with Don Cheadle dulling his skills to play to Binder's level of myopic male arrested development. The way the character of Allen is written, it is as if he doesn't need a reason to be unhappy and seeking release, he's a dude and dudes need to get out of the house and away from their wives sometimes. That is; literally, the level of Binder's insight into this character.

Reign Over Me is two different movies. One is a shallow exercise in male pattern selfishness. The other is a dark tale of sadness and loss featuring a shockingly good performance from an unexpected actor. If I told you that Don Cheadles was starring alongside Adam Sandler and that Sandler was the one delivering the knockout performance, would you believe me? Well that is what I am telling you and, trust me; I'm more shocked than you are.

Movie Review: 50 First Dates

50 First Dates (2004) 

Directed by Peter Segal 

Written by George Wing 

Starring Adam Sandler, Drew Barrymore, Blake Clark, Sean Astin, Dan Akroyd, Rob Schneider

Release Date February 13th, 2004

Published February 14th, 2004  

Adam Sandler has charted a strange career trajectory to becoming the highest paid actor in Hollywood. His films have run the gamut from awful to extraordinarily awful.  Then came Punch Drunk Love, Sandler's teaming with indie genius P. T Anderson, an unbelievable transformation into a real actor. Unfortunately, it didn't last. Sandler quickly regressed with the dreadful cartoon 8 Crazy Nights and a pair of mediocre live action comedies, Mr. Deeds and Anger Management. His latest film, 50 First Dates, continues Sandler's weird career twists and turns. A film that combines Sandler's best work since Punch Drunk Love and more of his most juvenile humor.

In 50 First Dates, Sandler is Henry Roth, a ladies man of mythic proportion. His legend is spread by the innumerable woman he meets while living in the vacation capital of Hawaii. Bedding vacationers and sending them off with some story of secret identities, or any other number of lies, Henry does all he can to avoid romantic entanglements. That is, until Henry meets Lucy Whitmore (Drew Barrymore), a flighty blonde teacher who eats at the same café every morning, reading the same Sunday newspaper, wearing the same outfit.

Odd? Indeed, and the explanation is even weirder. It seems Lucy was in an accident a year ago and as a result suffered a head injury that destroyed her short-term memory. Every night when she goes to bed her mind resets to the day of the accident. Her father Marlin (Blake Clark) and brother Doug (Sean Astin), not knowing how to deal with the situation, choose to relive the same day with her until they can find some other way to deal with it.

Despite the complicated nature of Lucy's condition, Henry can't resist her charm and begins finding different ways to introduce himself to her everyday. Eventually he even wins over her family and the romance grows as Henry sets about making Lucy remember him somehow and making her fall in love again everyday.

It's a concept that requires some suspension of disbelief but with Drew Barrymore's performance, that suspension is not hard at all. Barrymore delivers her best performance since she made Sandler somewhat less painful to watch in The Wedding Singer. It is her surprisingly complex, sweet performance that sells the far fetched memory loss concept and helps Sandler raise his game to the point where he actually assuages his usually cocky, doofus persona for a more laid back romantic sweetness that really works for him.

This is still an Adam Sandler film however, and his trademark juvenility is still in place. The difference in this film is that instead of Sandler wallowing in the film’s low humor, director Peter Seagal and writer George Wing smartly lay the film’s worst jokes on the supporting cast. That includes Sean Astin, lowering himself from the Oscar caliber Lord of The Rings to a subpar subplot as Barrymore's steroid abusing brother and Lusia Strus, an asexual security guard. Sandler's usual backup guys like Rob Schneider and Allen Covert are also along for the ride.

These subplots don't work but written with some distance from the main romantic plot, they do allow Sandler some separation from his usual antics allowing him to focus on being a likable, believable romantic lead. He pulls it off with romantic flourish, and an acceptable amount of sappy sentimental romance.

This Valentine's treat is one of the better romantic comedies of the last few years. In a genre that has suffered from formulaic plots and tired clichés it's not hard for a film like 50 First Dates to stand out. Still, I must give Sandler credit, when he wants to he can surprise you.

Movie Review: Anger Management

Anger Management (2003) 

Directed by Peter Segal 

Written by David S. Dorfman 

Starring Adam Sandler, Jack Nicholson, Marisa Tomei, Woody Harrelson, John Turturro 

Release Date April 11th, 2003

Published April 10th, 2003 

All the promise Adam Sandler showed in Punch Drunk Love quickly dissipated with his animated disaster 8 Crazy Nights. His producer's credit on Rob Schneider's The Hot Chick showed Sandler's recommitment to the stupidity that made him the idol of the fraternity crowd. I was set to write him off completely until I saw the trailer for Anger Management and the unlikely teaming of Sandler and the legendary Jack Nicholson. Many figured that with Nicholson involved, it could not possibly fail, and in box office terms, it won't. However, the possibility of creative failure was there and indeed realized with a poorly constructed script that even Nicholson can't overcome.

In Anger Management Sandler is Dave Buznik, a put upon office worker shy to the point of extreme introversion. It seems that everyone in Dave's life takes advantage of him except his very accepting girlfriend Linda (Marisa Tomei). While on a business trip Dave is accused of assaulting a flight attendant. Though it's clear that the mild-mannered Dave did not attack anyone he is still convicted of assault and sentenced to anger management therapy with a man named Buddy Rydell (Nicholson).

Dave is sent to Buddy's anger management class with an assortment of crazies including Luis Guzman, John Turturro and cameos by Bobby Knight and John McEnroe. Through more unfortunate circumstances, Dave is involved in a barfight and is sentenced to even more therapy, a new treatment that involves Dr. Rydell living with Dave and turning his life upside down.

The plot machinations that lead to Buddy and Dave living together make a certain amount of sense and to that point in the film the plot seems to unfold logically. However, cracks show throughout as the script by David Dorfman strains to combine realistic characters and over the top set pieces. The relationship between Dave and his girlfriend is sweet, believable and well played by Sandler and Tomei. However, the roadblocks placed in front of them by the plot are too stupid and contrived to be believed. 

There is also the film's strain to make room for unnecessary celeb cameos by the aforementioned Knight, McEnroe, Heather Graham, Derek Jeter, Roger Clemens and former New York mayor Rudy Guiliani whose cameo is uncomfortably tied to the film's plot.

The trailer for Anger Management showed so much promise and was so well done that it makes the film itself all the more disappointing. The promise of the trailer seemed to be a departure from Sandler's past histrionics from The Waterboy and Big Daddy and a move toward a more sensible and smart approach. The appearance of Jack Nicholson only seemed to further imply that. Unfortunately, the film is more of your typical Sandler: fart jokes, dick jokes and other various inanities.

Don't blame Jack for this one, every great actor will occasionally do a picture just to pick up a paycheck. Sandler has been just picking up a paycheck his entire career, save for Punch Drunk Love which as more time passes seems like it's from some alternate universe. On the other hand, maybe it just goes to show what a truly amazing talent P.T Anderson really is.

Movie Review Adam Sandler's Eight Crazy Nights

Adam Sandler's Eight Crazy Nights

Directed by Sean Kearsley

Written by Alan Covert, Adam Sandler

Starring Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider 

Release Date November 27th, 2002 

Published November 25th, 2002 

Just when Adam Sandler earns a modicum of respect with his sensational turn in Punch Drunk Love, he turns around and slaps the audience in the face with his trademark juvenile stupidity. It's like in High School when the popular jock would talk to the nerds until his friends came around. Then he would be mean and boorish again. (Not that I could relate to that story... stupid nerds.) 

This time around, it's an animated Sandler voicing Davey Stone, the meanest guy in town. Stone has made it a habit to ruin Hanukkah and Christmas for everyone in town since his parents died when he was twelve. After Davey gets drunk and steals a snowmobile that he uses to destroy a Hanukkah/Christmas ice sculpture, Davey is hauled into court where he should be sent away for ten years. 

Before he can be sentenced an old man named Whitey, also voiced by Sandler, volunteers to take Davey under his wing. Davey is sentenced to work with Whitey refereeing kids basketball games. At first, Davey doesn't change at all and is a complete jerk to Whitey and Whitey's sister Eleanore, also voiced by Sandler. Of course, in typical fashion, Whitey begins to wear Davey down and after a cute little song, they are friends until the script throws up one last roadblock to prolong the film until its forced happy ending. Along the way, we are treated to excrement, snot, and various other disgusting elements that Sandler has some juvenile affinity for. 

I would be lying if I said that 8 Crazy Nights didn't have a couple of good laughs: something this scatological can't help but hit the target once in a while. But the laughs are rare and not nearly sufficient to make 8 Crazy Nights worth seeing. 

Memo to Adam Sandler: Punch Drunk Love showed honest potential, as does your teaming with Jack Nicholson in the forthcoming Anger Management. There is no need for this kind of stupidity. 8 Crazy Nights is likely to make more money on its opening weekend than Punch Drunk Lovewill make during its entire run, but remember, quality work is its own reward.

Movie Review Punch Drunk Love

Punch Drunk Love (2002) 

Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson 

Written by Paul Thomas Anderson

Starring Adam Sandler, Emily Watson, Phillip Seymour Hoffman 

Release Date October 11th, 2002 

Published October 10th, 2002 

Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia was, in the eyes of this critic, an unqualified masterpiece. While some complained about its quirks, its length, and it's strange use of frogs, I defy anyone to create a scene as moving as the final shot of Melora Waters' smile at the end. The film was a long journey, but well worth the trip. Anderson's latest isn't quite the epic that Magnolia was but, in its minimalist manner, it is almost as moving, and it is a far greater surprise, considering it features an awesome lead performance from, of all actors, Adam Sandler.

In Punch-Drunk Love, Sandler plays Barry Egan, a schlubby, put-upon brother to seven overbearing sisters. Barry owns his own business selling novelty plungers, and spends his free time collecting Healthy Choice pudding. (More on the pudding later.) In the opening, we see Barry standing in front of his office, a converted garage, when, in typical PT Anderson fashion, he witnesses a massive car crash that is immediately followed by the unusual delivery of a small piano left at the end of an alley. Barry then meets Lena (Emily Watson), who is dropping off her car to be serviced at the garage next door. Actually, that was the excuse she was using so she could meet Barry before Barry's sister—who is Lena's best friend—could set them up.

The connection isn't immediate but Lena does see something in him. In the meantime, a lonely Barry makes the mistake of calling a 900 phone sex number. As it turns out the 900 number is part of an extortion scam being run by a furniture store manager in Utah named Dean Trumbell (Anderson favorite Phillip Seymour Hoffman). Eventually Barry and Lena do get together and it is their unique love story that is the soul of this very unusual film.

The pudding subplot is actually based on a true story. A guy in Los Angeles figured out that if he bought three thousand dollars worth of Healthy Choice pudding cups and redeemed them as part of a Healthy Choice frequent flier mile giveaway, he could earn enough miles to never have to pay for a plane ticket for the rest of his life. That actually happened, and it is these little details and character quirks that surround all of Anderson's characters. They can occasionally get tiresome if they become too obvious, but thanks to the amazing lead performances of Sandler and Watson, that never happens in Punch-Drunk Love.

Sandler is perhaps the biggest surprise of the year. I don't know if it's because the role was so well written or if he benefited so greatly from the supporting cast—Watson especially—but somehow, Sandler crafts a really stellar performance. (Did I just write that? Yes I did.) For the first time in his career, Sandler proves he can act. For a Saturday Night Live alum, that is saying something.

At a mere 89 minutes Punch-Drunk Love is barely a subplot compared to Magnolia, but that isn't a bad thing. As quirky as Punch-Drunk Love is, it's good that it never wears out its welcome. Watching Barry strain and push for any longer would make him more difficult to like, and he is already difficult to like. I don't think Punch-Drunk Love is as brilliant as Magnolia but, in its own way, it's charming and sweet, and features two very Oscar-worthy performances. Punch-Drunk Love is a unique, wonderful love story that shows a side of Adam Sandler that we will likely never see again.

Movie Review Mr. Deeds

Mr. Deeds (2002) 

Directed by Steven Brill

Written by Tim Herlihy

Starring Adam Sandler, Winona Ryder, John Turturro, Peter Gallagher, Jared Harris, Allan Covert 

Release Date June 28th, 2002 

Published June 27th, 2002

In 1934 the legendary Gary Cooper starred in Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town. Nearly 70 years later the film has been remade with the Gary Cooper role now filled by Adam Sadler. Did someone say the decline of western civilization? Well I wouldn't go so far as to say that this is the film that will destroy our culture. In fact, as much as I hate to admit it, Sandler's Mr. Deeds isn't that bad.

Deeds stars Sandler in his usual dopey earnest character. As Longfellow Deeds Sandler is a pizza shop owner in a small, New Hampshire town. Deed's also happens to be the sole heir to the fortune of his long lost uncle. The fortune is a company worth in excess of 40 billion dollars. Deeds however couldn't care less as he is more excited about the free trip to New York.

Peter Gallagher is the film’s formula bad guy out to dupe our hero into handing the company over to him. Also trying to take advantage of Deeds is a TV tabloid show. The show’s producer Babe (Winona Ryder) goes undercover and begins dating Deeds and secretly filming him for the show, leading to an hysterical cameo by John McEnroe. Well of course the formula dictates all that happens. Babe has a change of heart and falls in love for real, evil will be punished, and the company will be saved. The plot is meaningless.

Well of course it's meaningless, this is an Adam Sandler movie. The plot is merely in place to lend a little context to the jokes. What is most surprising is how funny those jokes are. Sandler and his supporting cast, which includes not only Rider and Gallagher, but also John Turturro and Steve Buscemi, all contribute some very funny moments, A lot of which is great physical humor.

I was honestly ashamed at how much I laughed during this film. I tried not to laugh, but I couldn't. Especially in scenes with Steve Buscemi as the guy with the crazy eyes. And then there is Sandler. He has always reminded me of an old friend of mine named Decker. Decker was never the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he was the guy to call if you ever had a problem. Sandler has that same “give you the shirt off his back” earnestness.

Maybe the key to his appeal is the fact that Sandler doesn't seem like a movie star. Instead he seems like a guy you could actually know. He has a goofy charm and friendliness that is easy to enjoy at least in short bursts.

Movie Review Grandma's Boy

Grandma's Boy (2006) 

Directed by Nicolaus Goosan 

Written by Barry Wernick, Alan Covert, Nick Swardson

Starring Alan Covert, Linda Cardelini, Kevin Nealon, Shirley Knight, Shirley Jones, Doris Roberts 

Release Date January 6th, 2006

Published January 6th, 2006 

Just how powerful is Adam Sandler in Hollywood? Apparently, in the wake of the release of the comedy Grandma's Boy, he can pick guys off the street and by attaching his name to them, get them on the big screen behind and in front of the camera.. The new stoner comedy Grandma's Boy is directed by former Adam Sandler gofer--okay, "production assistant"--Nicholaus Goosan and stars Sandler's entourage of worshipful friends, led by the charisma vacuum, Alan Covert. Grandma’s Boy  is a stunning example of both the continuing devolution of the modern comedy  genre and the star power of the only superstar ever created by SNL.

The Adam Sandler cult of personality--including Allen Covert, Peter Dante, Nick Swardson and former SNL chums Kevin Nealon, Rob Schneider and David Spade--come together to make Grandma's Boy, a fatally dull exercise in Sandler-style humor that fails to rise to even the low standards of one of Sandler's own films.

Allen Covert stars in Grandma's Boy as Alex, a 36-year-old stoner and video game tester who gave up the yoke of an accounting gig for life spent playing XBox with teenagers. When his stoner roommate gets him kicked out of his apartment, Alex is forced to move in with his grandmother Lilli (Doris Roberts, Everybody Loves Raymond) and her two roommates, doddering pill popper Bea (Shirley Knight) and foul mouthed, sex-obsessed Grace (Partridge Family star Shirley Jones).

At work, Alex and his even more arrested-development pal Jeff (Nick Swardson), a 20-something, footy pajama wearing mama's boy who sleeps in a race car bed, are testing the latest alien shoot-em-up videogame for a company called Brainasium. Kevin Nealon plays their stoner, vegan, boss who hires the super hot Sam (a slumming Linda Cardellini) to be Alex and Jeff's supervisor.

Alex has a rival at work, a game creator named J.P. (Joel Moore, Dodgeball) who, like Alex, develops a quick crush on Sam.  J.P, however, is no threat, as his proclivity for dressing like Neo from the Matrix and speaking in the voice of a robot when nervous or angry prevents him from much of any social interaction. The plot, such as it is, kicks in with Alex having created his own video game but being a shiftless, pothead layabout he does nothing about it until his idea is stolen. Then, in a requirement of the film's plot and title, only his grandma can step in to save him.

That is the story (or at least what passes for a story) that propels Grandma's Boy toward an ending. However, this is not a movie that is concerned with plot. Rather, drop the 'l' and you get what the real subject of Grandma's Boy, getting super high. I have no problem with that, but don’t make a movie if your only idea is to get high and play video games. Just stay home and do that. As a ‘movie’ Grandma's Boy is a stoner movie with all of the stoner cliches of munchies, morons, and a monkey. The monkey is actually a carryover from Adam Sandler’s movies as he requires a funny animal bit in all of his movies, regardless of whether it's funny or not. 

The actors in Grandma's Boy are  obviously Adam Sandler's comic B-team and I imagine behind the scenes, this group of friends are a riot. On screen, I am at a loss to see why they are appealing. Covert and the rest of this cast have little to nothing original or funny to say or do. It’s as if Sandler owed a friend with a screenplay a favor and then realized that even he had a standard he could not drop below. Instead, he handed the script to Covert and tricked a studio into letting his buddies make a movie. 

Poor Shirley Jones. The former mama Partridge humiliates herself in the role of a slutty older woman who claims to have slept with Charlie Chaplin and Don Knotts on different occasions. In Grandma's Boy, Jones thinks she is in on the joke of her character being a sex mad older woman but in fact she is the subject of the joke in which she seduces Nick Swardson's manchild Jeff. Grandma’s Boy is a movie made by people who think that just the idea of a person over 60 having sex is somehow funny. 

The only actor to survive the carnage of Grandma's Boy is the lovely Linda Cardellini. Far more skilled than the "actors" she has chosen to work with, Cardellini gamely throws herself into the stoner fun of Grandma's Boy. However, when it comes down to it, you can tell Cardellini is not inhaling the fumes. Cardellini picks up her paycheck and escapes the fray of Grandma's Boy by affecting an above-it-all air.

That Grandma's Boy did not go directly to the video store is a testament to Adam Sandler's clout and nothing more. That he does not even deign to cameo in Grandma's Boy and still manages to overshadow every aspect of the film. It says something, not anything good, about Sandler’s connection to his audience--the audience for Grandma's Boy likely loved Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison--and how his entourage of pals pretending to be actors are linked to him. Grandma’s Boy doesn’t exist without Sandler wielding his star power to get it made. 

Fans of pot humor, old people having sex, and monkeys may find something to enjoy in Grandma's Boy, but for the other 98% of the movie going public there is nothing to enjoy about this Adam Sandler-less Adam Sandler flick.

Movie Review Funny People

Funny People (2009)

Directed by Judd Apatow 

Written by Judd Apatow 

Starring Adam Sandler, Seth Rogen, Leslie Mann, Eric Bana, Jonah Hill, Jason Schwartzman 

Release Date July 31st, 2009

Published July 30th, 2009 

Comics have their own idiom, a way of speaking that is more often than not aggressive and abnormal. Words are their weapons and they wield them with particular expertise. Listen to comedian Patton Oswalt, a shambling, unkempt often alcohol infused comic whose word use is as precise and exacting as your average marksmen is with a high caliber rifle. The brain of the comic is different always, searching at all times for the absurd in the average, that detail that they can see that the average person misses. That brain gets a thorough and exacting examination in Funny People, Judd Apatow's adroit, mature comedy of penis jokes and honest to goodness pathos.

Adam Sandler is the star of Funny People playing a variation on his real life superstar career. His George Simmons is one of the biggest stars in the world thanks to movies like Mer-Man where he plays, you guessed it, a half man half fish and Re-Do where Sandler's soft ball like skull is placed on the body of a baby by cheesy CGI. You can sense the shame he feels over these movies, made only to line his pockets, and purchase cars he never drives and a large, Xanadu-esque mansion that he doesn't need, and one can't help but wonder if the shame applies in real life to dreck like Little Nicky or Billy Madison. Probably not, but I can dream.

The shame can be seen in George when he see's himself worshipped in the eyes of his new assistant Ira (Seth Rogan). Hired to help write jokes so George can go back to where he feels most at home, the comedy stage, Ira becomes George's only real friend, even if he won't admit it. It's a forced friendship with young Ira carrying most of the burden especially after George reveals he has a rare blood disease and may soon be dead. That's a lot for Ira to carry but he does carry it and soon Ira begins to develop his own talents and find his own comic persona through the mirror of George's age and and hard won wisdom.

Outside of his wealth and privilege, George's life is empty and impending death has only magnified the void. He now longs for all the stuff he took for granted as a younger man, things family and children. Ira helps George reconnect with his parents and sister and even a few of his comic 'friends' who are more like fellow former hostages of some unknown captor. They aren't friends, they just share the same trauma it seems and that bonds them.

The one person George really hopes to reconnect with however, is Laura, the only woman he ever really loved. Laura is now married and living in San Francisco. She comes to George after he reveals his illness and the reunion is emotional in the way one might talk to someone who dying, an exaggerated pseudo-truth that takes conversational reality to a heightened emotional realm. Yes, Laura loved him once and, in his dying state, she forgives him his indiscretions of the past but is he really the love of her life? That could just be comfort food for the dying.

Well, George will find out if Laura is for real. The last 45 minutes of Funny People is dedicated to George surviving his illness and deciding to chase the life he thinks he always wanted. What happens then is for you to discover but thanks to the exceptionally smart and true writing and direction of Judd Apatow you are in for something funny and unexpected. For those trained by The 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up to expect a lot of foul humor, your training comes in handy. Apatow's verbiage is as scatological and unapologetically foul as ever. The difference is the level of sophistication in the way these words are used. Comics use foul language in such a secondary, comfortable manner that it's less natural when they don't use them.

Adam Sandler has shown in the past that beneath the juvenile mask is an immensely talented actor. He simply cannot often enough restrain his id and allow that talent some time in the sun. In Funny People the mask is off and the talent shines like never before. His George is a stunningly bitter, brusque and off-putting guy who makes no apologies for being repugnant. He is fully conscious of his disgust for himself and in finding death he turns that disgust toward whatever human target is close by. As in his shame for his movies, George loathes the people who love them as much as she loathes himself for making them love him. He lives the old Groucho Marx maxim "I would never be a part of a club that would have me as a member".

Sandler's performance in Funny People is so raw and remarkable that you must wonder how true it all is to the real life of Adam Sandler. Thankfully, in real life Sandler appears to be happily married with children and close friends. It's very likely however, that Sandler knows a George Simmons and shares a deep sympathy with him. Sandler comes at this role with such ferocity and authentic self-loathing and contempt for the world that it just feels real. Then there is the blurring of the lines when George/Adam criticizes his terrible movie roles and that blurring of the lines becomes an uncanny valley between real life and the funny fiction of Funny People. 

As for Seth Rogen, I loved how Rogen's Ira represents all the hope and joy that has seemingly slipped away from jaded George and the way that Ira's youth and enthusiasm enlivens the mentor-student relationship of Geore and Ira. Rogen plays Ira as his usual foul-mouthed man-child, the persona he has perfected in his short but fast rising career. However, Rogen and Apatow take great care to make Ira the heart of the story and use the character as a mirror to highlight the best and worst of George while deepening both characters through their growth together as friends and colleagues. It's a dynamite dynamic and the chemistry between Rogen and Sandler is outstanding. 

With Adam Sandler delivering a career best performance and Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow showing newfound maturity and complexity, Funny People becomes one of the best movies you will see all year. Funny People is also another maddening symbol of how incredibly talented Adam Sandler can be when he wants to be. It makes me dislike Sandler more when he makes terrible comedies because I have seen a movie like this and I can see how talented he is. It's frustrating to watch him make some of the worst movies in the world when he's capable of making movies like this.