Review of You Don't Mess with the Zohan (2008) by Markb. — 12 Jun 2008

Sophomoric can be good. The Zucker brothers, the Farrelly brothers, even the Marx brothers can be like a breath of fresh air in a dusty waxworks museum. Pablo Picasso once said that the enemy of art is good taste.

..but then, Picasso didn't live long enough to see any Adam Sandler movies! More often than not, the undeniably talented comic actor's hits (Billy Madison, Big Daddy, The Longest Yard, Click ad nauseum) personify him not only as an arrested adolescent but a perpetually (and psychotically) angry one; the box office success of movies as unpleasant as those reveals things about their fans that I'm not sure I want to know.

So it's a relief that Sandler's latest, You Don't Mess With the Zohan, is, relatively speaking, not too mean-spirited (although why Sandler continues to find humor in making children cry is way beyond me).

As an Israeli James Bond/ Rambo combo who seeks a new life as a hair stylist in the US, Sandler gives a surprisingly disciplined, even graceful performance that's reminiscent, of all things, of his rather sweet romantic comedy turn in his least characteristic movie, James L.

Brooks' Spanglish. Other enjoyable performances back Sandler's up: Emmanuelle Chriqui is a charming leading lady; Lainie Kazan's crack comic timing put me in mind of her uproarious portrayal of the ultimate Jewish mom in 1982's My Favorite Year (and she doesn't look like she's aged a day since); as two of the Zohan's old foes, John Turturro is amusing (even if he's in danger of becoming this decade's answer to Vito Scotti if he takes on too many more ethnic roles), while Sandler's longtime buddy and perpetual hanger-on Rob Schneider for once DOESN'T make you want to tear out either his hair or your own.

And here, as in last year's I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, Sandler interestingly attempts to blend genuine social commentary with copious gross-out humor in much the same way that Mel Brooks did in Blazing Saddles (a movie that, beyond the beans-around-the-campfire gags, wore its heart so firmly on its sleeve in favor of racial brotherhood that it stopped just short of singing "Kumbaya" to its audience); Sandler, who's admirably never been shy about proudly proclaiming his Jewishness, takes on xenophobia, suggests that Israelis and Palestinians CAN get along and--most controversially of all, perhaps--makes a case that disco music CAN be enjoyable in the right time and place.

So why the 4? Simply because, unlike Blazing Saddles, Zohan (with the exception of one smart throwaway joke involving a terrorist telephone hot line) just isn't funny; the writing is extremely scattershot, hummus-on-the-wall, and frequently just plain desperate.

Worst of all is Sandler's and director Dennis Dugan's conviction that endlessly referring to its title character's "package" is in and of itself a laff riot: the character Biggus Diccus in Monty Python's Life of Brian notwithstanding, the only time a huge penis in the movies is funny is in certain triple-X rated movies from the days of yore when John Holmes used to almost trip over his own.