A Film Review Of

Genre: Comedy

Cast: Jack Nicholson, Adam Sandler, Marisa Tomei, John Turturro, Woody Harrelson

Synopsis: A mild-mannered businessman (Sandler) is wrongly accused of a crime and sentenced to an anger management program, where he discovers that his instructor (Nicholson) is a crazy psycho with his own serious anger management problem, and is probably the one man in the world most capable of making his new student blow his lid.

Pros: Performances, Good Laughs and Premise

Cons: Romance, Sappy and Ending

Film Review: As time goes by we've seen two types of comedy which Adam Sandler seems to stick with. The first is the dumb college style frat boy jokes from the likes of "The Waterboy" to "Little Nicky", the other and far superior is a more sweet-natured but still almost skit-like comedy with a romantic or well-meaning centre ala "The Wedding Singer" and "Big Daddy". 'Anger' is more like the latter group and certainly, short of the masterpiece that was 'Wedding', is one of the best he's ever done. Why does it work? Well much like "Analyze This" it has him playing the straight guy to a very talented dramatic actor with a penchant for comedy - in this case Jack.

Make no mistake without Nicholson this film certainly wouldn't fly as high as it does. From facial expressions to a great sense of timing, Jack knows how to work it and work it well whilst his chemistry with Sandler proves a surprisingly effective combination. Sandler himself is given a more ordinary run-of-the-mill style character than usual but plays it with effective restraint. Tomei is a waste of a character and performance, and its the romance subplot which is easily the film's biggest fault. Turturro gives his best work in a long time, Guzman is just brilliant and even Heather Graham & Woody Harrelson turn in great work (a real surprise there).

While David Dorfman's script isn't quite the home run 'Analyze' was due to its falling into to many cliche potholes, it nevertheless has its own little rewards. From some brilliant dialogue to some clever setups, the material isn't fresh but is pulled off well. That's not to say there are misses because there sure are - a subplot about Tomei's best friend with a huge cock yields mostly puerile unfunny gags, a sequence at a monastery is funny but too over the top, a truly brilliant sequence on a bridge involving a "West Side Story" song is undermined by the song's overuse later on, and then of course the ending. The last 20 minutes or so of the movie falls into extremely overrun and worst of all utterly ridiculous territory with so many coincidences popping up it feels as though Dorfman is playing a gag on us. Lets not even get started on the woeful Rudolph Giuliani cameo.

Overall is this what one would call a successful studio comedy? Well, yeah I guess so. It still has many of the problems which plague the genre, though its overall sweet-natured tone and well-paced material yields a better than average number of laughs. Even the soggier gags which never really fly are at least not too bad or limp. Production values are solid - a forgettable score but standard slick lock, and Berg's directorial skill seems solid if undistinctive. Its ending may put people off and ultimately sabotages its chances of becoming a 'classic Sandler' flick, and the opening gags have been spoiled by the trailers, yet there's still plenty here that make it worth a look see.