In the most far-fetched and thinly-related remake of "Cactus Flower," the 1969 Goldie Hawn film for which she won both Golden Globe and Academy Awards, "Just Go With It" inserts outrageous set-ups to get the kind of laughs you feel guilty emitting. The plot involves a Beverly Hills plastic surgeon (Sandler) who gets girls sans expectations by pretending he's married, and in order to snag one on a more permanent basis becomes embroiled in a series of lies that find his office manager (Aniston) playing his estranged wife, and her two children, theirs. Sandler's new 23-year-old girlfriend (Decker), his breaking-up family and a tagalong cousin who poses as Aniston's sheep-importer boyfriend coincidentally named Dolph Lundgren (Nick Swardson) all go to Hawaii, to humor one of the kids, whose fondest wish is to swim with the dolphins. Of course, in forming that desire, the child forgot he can't swim.
Logical lags like that one fly faster than the tasteless comments, which are ubiquitous and obnoxious. Though the plastic surgeon starts off the movie in a flashback showing his early life with an objectionably enormous Jewish nose, apparently imperfect rhinoplasty turned his schnozz into that of Adam Sandler. And in a final scene, we see he neglected to use his medical specialty to assist the overgrown probosces of the rest of his family.
The wild and disgusting scenes just keep coming. Try these: The cousin performs the Heimlich Maneuver to help a comatose sheep cough up a dog toy at a Hawaiian restaurant; the fractured family walks in a slow-motion scene through a parking lot where a child appears out of nowhere to angrily splash a large soda onto his pregnant mom's ready-to-drop belly; Aniston and Sandler carry on about her lunch date and she takes a call from the suitor--in the examining room while they dab and pinch anesthetic cream onto the uneven breasts of a woman whose implant internally exploded.
The plot goes exactly where you expect it to, but in so doing throws in the obligatory find-out-he's-gay sidelight (clue: the guy can pick up a coconut with his buttocks), two unbearable, never remotely real kids, a blithe attitude toward money and materialism, and a bleached-blond girlfriend so bimbo-esque she'll nod to anything. There's something to offend everybody.
It took me two minutes to turn to my husband and plead, "get me outta here." Unfortunately, he had to stay, and I didn't feel like walking home, but at least my facial muscles got a workout from all that cringing. Spare yours, however, since "Just Go With It" is better titled with the warning, "Don't Go To It." Oooooh, what a bomb.
too bad, it looked like it had such promise. (not!)
ReplyDeleteit's like every comedian to make it big, insert here Jim Carey, Will Ferrell, Robin Williams, et. al. ad infinitum, goes through a few really genuinely funny (read original) movies, and then blam ... the hackneyed, total crap scripts start to hit the fan.
enter adam sandler. looks like the egg timer is ticking on his career (and $20 million paydays!) too bad, b/c, it ironically started with a movie that i liked called ... wait for it ... "funny people."
another great post.
Oh Diane, it's bad enough that Michael has to sit through so many movie bombs, it's a shame that you had to, also! For a long time our culture has confused crudeness with sophistication. When will they get a clue????
ReplyDeleteI'd stop in my half way. It is my big frustration,I though there are more on this movie but just nothing. I'd rather jump in a room for Plastic surgery Beverly Hills is my pick place for that then.
ReplyDeleteI was irritated too much by the commercials to even consider viewing yet another terrible "comedy" about juvenile men and moronic women. But thanks for the heads up. On another note -I agreed with your post on another site on virtual goods. The trend is disturbing to say the least. Worse of all is that the industry is leaning toward turniing kids into virtual shoppers. Yikes. No iPods for my 3 boys as long as I can hold off.
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