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By: The Dude on the Right

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Turkey Day is done, and along with tales of eating said turkey, Stu Gotz and I also give some of our tales of Black Friday during this podcast episode of the “Weekend Wrap-Up!”, but not before reminiscing about some old days of Adam Sandler.

Low and behold, for reasons we weren’t even able to understand, both Stu and I went out to the stores on Black Friday, with Stu having to do some finagling at a Staples to get the bargain he was looking for, while I was amazed at the lack of crowds at Sam’s Club, Home Depot, and JCPenney, although shopping at one in the afternoon may have had something to do with that.

And with the holiday being a long weekend, it wouldn’t be a holiday weekend without some movie watching, so we also give our detailed analysis of “The Muppets,” letting you know if it’s good for the kids and if the nostalgia factor might make you cry (okay, I didn’t admit to Stu that I got weepy – I really didn’t want him to call my a puss). I give a quick preview of “The Help” which comes out on Blu-ray on December 6th, Stu watched “Super 8″ and isn’t really sure who will like it, we revisit “Captain America,” we don’t give the Chicago Bears much discussion as they sucked and lost, Stu found another Starbucks’ bathroom that had a toilet seat fully of pee (Now he’s trying to blame women for it thanks to our friend Trash), and I break the news to Stu that “Community” might be going off of the air soon.

A holiday weekend has come and gone and we both survived! Hooray!

Thanks for listening!

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:35 Long
A Review by:
- Stu Gotz

So what’s it all about?
Sonny Koufax is a cynical, slightly ill-tempered, New York City born and raised slacker that never grew out of his college mentality. He lives off a frivolous lawsuit, works as a toll booth attendant one day a week, has a roommate raking in the big bucks, and wonders why his girlfriend is dumping him. Hmm…

So, one day, his roomie, Kevin (Jon Stewart), has to go out of town to go handle a big case for his law firm in China. Unfortunately that same day, Kevin’s unknown son shows up on their doorstep. Sonny figures he can handle him in Kevin’s absence, and here’s where the cheap laughs begin. Sonny’s solution to spilt milk? Put a news paper on it. Sonny’s solution to a wet bed? Put newspaper on it. Sonny’s solution to vomit? Put newspaper on it. Are you getting the idea that Sonny is in over his head? Well, in a short time he realizes it too, but rather that sending the kid to an orphanage, Sonny tries to stick it out a little longer. This is when he discovers that little kids are chick-magnets.

Enter the thinly written love interest Layla (Joey Lauren Adams) and the beginning of the change in Sonny’s lifestyle. You see, up to this point Sonny has been keeping little Julian as somewhat of a pet. He lets the kid dress like he wants, eat what he wants, shows him how to scam money off dented Spaghettio’s, and how to get cheap laughs by tripping rollerbladers in Central Park. Along with little Julian’s school teacher, who informs Sonny that little Julian is “the smelly kid”, Layla brings out a deeply, hidden, seriousness in Sonny that turns the tide of his irresponsible lifestyle and handling of little Julian. Sonny now takes a responsible attitude in raising Julian making sure the kid is squeaky clean, doing his homework, dressing well, eating properly, and no longer getting his kicks from watching rollerbladers wipe out. Quite a change indeed. Too bad the state finds out the Sonny is in custody of Julian illegally and snatches little Julian off to an orphanage.

Julian being taken into state custody comes as quite a blow to Sonny and this situation straightens him out even more so he decides to fight for the right to raise Julian by going to court. Now if you had a hard time buying any part of this movie up until now, you’re not gonna believe any of the court BS. But hey!!! It’s a movie… A comedy… With Adam Sandler… You just have to suspend reality and enjoy the laughs as they come. Hmm… “suspend reality and enjoy the laughs as they come.” I like that and that really is the best way to prepare yourself for this or any other Adam Sandler movie. So anyway, in the end, Adam doesn’t but does get Julian back. “Does but doesn’t” you ask? Hey, that’s all I’m gonna say. I’m not gonna spoil the whole movie for you.

What Did I Think?
You’ve got to love a movie that prominently mentions or features Hooter’s throughout. But seriously, I expect that this will be another hit for Adam. It doesn’t match up to “The Wedding Singer” as far as romance goes and isn’t as far-out and zany as “The Waterboy” was, but, what it is, is a good blend of slapstick with shtick. What does that mean? It goes for cheap, but still good, laughs and funny, real-life situations magnified as Sandler can do. The movie didn’t take itself too seriously, never bored me, didn’t over do the whole love plot thing, made me laugh so hard I almost choked on my popcorn, didn’t make me feel cheated out of 8 bucks, so I give it 4 of 5 stars. Plus, it had Hooters’ Girls!!!

It’s a great film, and I’m Stu Gotz! ’nuff said.

Oh, wait, I do have one more thing to say… Piss on all you critics that slammed this movie. Not all films are meant to be art. Some are just intended to be mindless and entertaining. “Big Daddy” wasn’t totally mindless, but sure was entertaining!

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:46 Long
A Review by:
- The Dude on the Right

As Adam Sandler seems to continue his trek to be considered a respected actor and not just a joke that’s been played too many times, now comes “Anger Management,” teaming him with Jack Nicholson and including Marisa Tomei, both respected in their profession. Can Adam prove himself to be in their league, or is he his normal over-the-top self? Only the movie will tell, but for now I can tell you this…

“Anger Management” has Sandler sentenced to take some, well, anger management therapy, after an altercation on an airplane. Assigned to him is Nicholson, who moves in with Sandler, and begins his twisted therapy. At first Sandler seems to do his best to keep his cool, but then Nicholson pushes him over the edge and hilarity is supposed to ensue.

The movie does look to have potential, especially Nicholson’s character, and Sandler has the potential to team up well with him, but for me it will be difficult to take Sandler’s character seriously, especially when to me he will always be Happy, Billy, and Pip. Hopefully he can make me forget them.

That’s it for this preview! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:37 Long
A Review by:
- The Dude on the Right

If you do not want to read any spoilers about this movie, “Click,” stop reading now, because for this movie I have no problem giving away key plot points, and I will be quick to give some key plot points right away in this review. I will even give you my rating now so you don’t have to continue if you don’t want to, and for “Click” I give the movie 1 ½ stars out of 5. It does have some funnies, but not many, and Kate Beckinsale is smoking hot and pretty much the movie gets 1 ½ stars because of her and the fact that she likes to role-play, but that’s another story for another time.

“Click” gives us Adam Sandler as Michael, in a movie that had a lot of potential to just be a funny, goofy movie, but tried to get way too preachy, and it didn’t work. As it is, Michael is an architect in a firm where he is trying to get the next promotion. His boss is Mr. Ammer (David Hasselhoff). As such he has to work too much and sacrifice family time for getting the next project done. At home things are hectic, with his two kids, and his smokin’ hot wife, Donna (Beckinsale). Time after time Michael misses family things because of work things, and somehow every remote control for the family is in his family room. That’s right, you’ve got the remote for the ceiling fan, the remote for the garage door, the remote for a remote-controlled car, etc. The remote that seems to be missing is the remote for the TV, and when he really needs this remote he heads to the place in the middle of the night that you would think would have a Universal Remote, “Bed, Bath, and Beyond.” Alright, it is the only store that is open this late at night. Well, Michael gets there, meets a creepy dude, and lays down on a bed proclaiming he is tired. This is the instant that I lost it because I knew, from there, that the rest of the movie was pretty much a dream, although the movie folks tried to show, in the end, it wasn’t.

So Michael, now in his dream-state, finds a door labeled “Beyond,” and he finds Morty (Christopher Walken), who gives Michael the Universal Remote he has been looking for. This remote isn’t just for his TV, it’s for his life. It can control the volume of his dog’s barking, it can let him fast-forward through fights with his wife, it can fast-forward, well, pretty much this remote is all about the fast-forwarding, and it learns what Michael wants to fast-forward through, and then does so automatically. Suddenly Michael is fast-forwarding through his life, a lot of times at ten years at a time, and wondering how he got divorced from his wife, how his little girl grew up into a hottie with big boobs, how his dog died, how he got fat, and how he ends up at his son’s wedding. And so, yes, with the help of Morty, he learns his lesson, that he shouldn’t have made his life about work, that he should have made his life about his family, and in his last, dying breath (doesn’t this sound like a great comedy), he tries to convince his son that going on his honeymoon is more important than going to a business meeting.

Next thing you know, Michael wakes up.

Yup, there Michael is, in the bed in the “Bed, Bath and Beyond” he found himself “tired” in, realizing his life isn’t over, that he can make it better, if only he becomes a family man instead of letting Mr. Ammer rule his life. Ahh, lessoned learned, but to try to say “Michael wasn’t dreaming,” when Michael gets back home from “Bed, Bath and Beyond,” low-and-behold, there on the kitchen table, it the “Universal” remote, and a note from “Morty,” asking Michael if he knows how to use the remote know. Duh, Michael throws the remote in the trash (could a sequel be there if the movie makes enough money?).

There have been way-too-many movies proclaiming that you should make sure you spend time with your family as opposed to your work, and a lot of them did a decent job. This movie didn’t because it publicized itself as a movie about a dude getting a remote control that can control his life, and it is supposed to be funny. Instead it ends up a way-to-sort-of-serious movie, preaching the importance of family. And even with the funny, it wasn’t really funny. There was a way overdone subplot of the family dog humping a giant, stuffed duck; The funny moments were pretty much already in the trailer; and one of my gauges as to how good a movie will be still holds true – when they publicize the hell out of the movie, it will leave a lot to be desired.

What sort of makes me sad is that Adam Sandler can be very funny, but lately he has been involved with movies that just fail to remember how to make the funny and instead try to get a little serious. The little kids were great in the movie, and Kate Beckinsale, just being the gorgeous dudette she is, left me getting this movie above the 1 star mark, so like I said at the beginning, it’s 1 ½ stars out of 5 for “Click.” I’m almost afraid Adam Sandler has lost the funny. That would be too bad.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:36 Long
A Review by:
- The Dude on the Right

Maybe it’s just Adam Sandler’s way to make sure guys can have some fun when they have to go see romantic comedies with their dudettes – toss in some vomit joke, some nipple rubbing, and jokes about wet dreams. Me, I actually thought those jokes took away from what was developing into a sweet, romantic movie. Maybe I’m just becoming a puss as I age. Here’s the story.

Sandler plays Henry Roth. Marine veterinarian by day, dude to show tourist women a good time by making up all kinds of professions only to leave them without even a phone number by night. Opening the movie we are treated to an onslaught of testimonials of Henry’s ability to show a good time, so Henry is instantly painted as a womanizer. Then one day he finds himself in a café and sees Lucy (Drew Barrymore). For a change he finds a girl that makes him happy, actually can see himself getting in a real relationship with her, and his womanizing ways might be over. After their getting-to-know-each-other breakfast, they agree to meet each other for breakfast the next day, only when Henry arrives for their breakfast date, he is shocked that Lucy doesn’t remember him. It is explained to him that Lucy has short-term memory loss caused by a car accident about a year ago. Pretty much all of her memories lead up to the day of the accident and every time she goes to sleep, well, the previous day is gone. Henry then learns that her father and brother, along with the café patrons, do their best to keep each day the same so she doesn’t freak out finding out about the accident. This leads to every day being the same for dad and brother, watching a tape of the same football game they were scheduled to watch, and seeing “The Sixth Sense” every night because Lucy was giving it to dad as a birthday present. Lucy constantly thinks it’s the Sunday of her dad’s birthday, and everyone else plays along. But Henry thinks things can be different.

After slowly getting approval from dad to start seeing his daughter, and seeing how a day goes when Lucy finds out what happened, Henry develops a plan so that every morning Lucy starts the day watching a video tape explaining the accident, how her friends and family love her, and how she is dating Henry. An hour or two after this, Lucy accepts her fate and at least now gets to have a new day, with new discoveries, and Henry not having to work as hard to get her to like him because the tape already explains that they’re dating. All is going well for our happy couple until one day Lucy discovers that Henry is giving up on his dream to sail to Alaska and study walruses so he can be with Lucy. She decides to dump Henry, erase him out of her journal she has now been keeping, and he’ll be able to get on with his life. Blah, blah, blah, yea, they live happily ever after, although the ending isn’t as cookie cutter as you might think, which I did find refreshing.

Anyway, the movie is cute in the aspect of the chemistry between Lucy and Henry that develops every day. There’s a scene where Lucy has a beach party with the friends she hasn’t seen in a year, comments on all of their changes, and when one of Lucy’s girlfriends questions Adam on his having to make sure Lucy falls in love with him every day, she slaps her husband asking him why he can’t do the same. It’s those cute moments that make the film. But, in Adam Sandler tradition, the film is laced with uncomfortable weirdness and sexual humor that, although funny in their weirdness ways, I found took away from the movie. Case in point – Ula (Rob Schneider), Henry’s friend, being a sort of creepy sidekick who likes to rub his nipples and stores a joint down his butt-crack.

I liked the movie, but for a change found the sexual humor mostly stupid and unnecessary. Sure the premise for the movie is sort of out there, but there is a sweetness in Henry that Sandler plays well, and Barrymore does a great job with the Lucy character treating each new day with an innocence of that first date, that first kiss, that first time you realize you love someone. The movie really didn’t need a walrus barfing on Henry’s vet assistant, Alexa (Lusia Strus), whom we are pretty sure is a woman, but looks like a man, nor the idea that Doug (Sean Astin), Lucy’s brother, wants to know if steroids can cause wet dreams. It stood as a better romantic comedy on its original premise and really didn’t need the crude humor. 2 ½ stars out of 5. I probably would have given it 3 ½, but the unnecessary stabs at humor cost it a star in my book.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!