Review of Punch-Drunk Love (2002) by David F — 30 Mar 2013

This is a pretty weird movie about a pretty weird plunger salesman in the San Fernando Valley. Plumbing the loneliness and frustration of Barry Egen, played pretty effectively by Adam Sandler, the movie has a few deep, insightful passages, like the scene where he nervously reaches out to a phone sex operator whose ad he stumbled upon while executing a plan to accumulate frequent flyer miles by buying Healthy Choice pudding.

But overall the film tries your patience and comes up short with only very few such rewarding stretches.