The creator of the amazing film “”Boogie Nights”” and the incredibly overrated, over hyped, self-indulgent crap fest that is “”Magnolia”” is back, and this time Adam Sandler has tagged along for the ride. Paul Thomas Anderson brings us his latest film, “”Punch Drunk Love””.
In PDL Adam Sandler is Barry Egan, a small business owner with seven sisters whose abuse has kept him alone and unable to fall in love. When a harmonium and a mysterious woman (Emily Watson) enter his life, his romantic journey begins. Now I’ve made no secret of my absolute loathing of Magnolia, but by the same token, I adore “”Boogie Nights”” and Adam Sandler is likeable enough, despite all the bad films he’s made. Well after all the advanced hype and overwhelming praise for this film I was looking forward to seeing this and man talk about a let down. Most of the advanced buzz on this film is that Adam Sandler does a “”surprise”” breakout performance in this film, that he plays a character that is so unique that they are amazed that he can do “”drama””. Well all I have to say is, bulls#$####. Anyone who has seen any of Sandler’s previous films will recognize the character he plays here. He’s the shy, quiet, guy who is surrounded by people who try and push him too far, he’s constantly taken advantage of, his sisters bully him (in a loving way of course), but every person has their breaking points, their buttons that people can push and when that happens, he “”snaps”” and will vent his frustrations and anger at “”random”” bursts of violence.Well hello? Anyone see the god awful Mr. Deeds? Or “”The Waterboy””, “”Happy Gilmore””, etc…? It’s the same character! The only difference is he’s doing the character in a “”dramatic”” movie as opposed to his usual god awful comedies. In his comedies, he usually uses this character as a “”straight man”” to all the comedy elements. In this film, without the comedy elements, you realize just how shallow the character is. Or maybe it’s not a character, maybe this is the true Adam Sandler that we’re seeing here. I’m not saying that Sandler is particularly bad in this, but it’s not a real illuminating performance or an interesting film either. This film is only 90 minutes but it felt like 3 hours, it was slow, not involving, meandering, etc. P.T.A. had an interesting “”character””, but didn’t have a story to put him in, so he invents this silly, unbelievable conflict where Barry gets into trouble with a phone sex line and an operator who tries to extort money out of him. In PDL the film is all about this character. The film does very little to explore what makes Barry the way he is, it shows his behavior on a very superficial level, his sisters call him “”gay boy””, he smashes a window, he’s out on a date and his date talks about his sisters calling him “”gay boy”” he smashes the bathroom. That’s it, that’s the entire film.It’s well shot, the direction is basically long stationary shots, nothing interesting going on with the editing at all. This film is a step above being a student film and one gets the feeling that the only reason it was able to get made is because of the people behind it, namely Paul Thomas Anderson (whose stock has quickly fallen with me) and Adam Sandler who for some unknown reason I keep giving chances. I didn’t hate this film and didn’t love it, it’s a perfectly bland film. Final Grade DReview by Michelle AlexandriaPosted 10/17/02