That’s My Boy

Posted on June 14, 2012 at 6:00 pm

Oscar Wilde’s famous story The Picture of Dorian Gray is about a dissolute young man who retains his youthful beauty as his portrait, hidden in the attic, shows his face becoming more aged and corrupt.  I can’t help thinking that somewhere there is a young Adam Sandler while we watch his screen persona grow more and more repulsively scrofulous.  As revolting as this movie is — and it is truly and deeply loathsome — that isn’t the worst part.  More offensive than the disgusting attempts at humor that debase every life form is the utter contempt for the audience that shows in every lazy and incompetent frame and line of dialogue, with Sandler’s lines all said in that horrible comic voice he uses to show he is playing a stupid person.  And more depressing than all of that is the horrific sight of Sandler’s insistence on creating the most unpleasant character imaginable and then having all of the other characters find him irresistible.

I have no problem with humor that is politically incorrect or even offensive (see my review of “The Dictator”) if there is some intelligence behind it and some point to be made.  But this movie’s “comedy” has less wit than a two-year old making diaper jokes.  He is not pushing boundaries and challenging assumptions.  He is making fun of fat naked people.  It is vile.

Sandler plays Donny, a man who was seduced by his middle school teacher (Eva Amurri Martino) when he was 12.  She became pregnant, and since she was serving a 30-year sentence, he got custody of their son before he was in high school.  And so he named the baby “Han Solo” and gave him candy for breakfast.  Most of the movie takes place when the boy, now using the name “Todd Peterson” (Andy Samberg) is about to get married to Jamie (Leighton Meester, looking like Winnie from “The Wonder Years”).  He has told everyone his parents were killed in an explosion and has done his best to be the responsible grown-up his father never was.  He is a successful hedge fund manager staying at the home of the wealthy boss (Tony Orlando!) he hopes will make him a partner.  The boss has an elderly mother, of course.  Another one of Sandler’s obsessions is sex with old ladies.  

Donny, who has blown through all of the money he made selling his story for a made-for-TV movie (starring Ian Ziering), will have to go to prison if he can’t get $43,000 for the IRS.  His only hope is to get Han/Todd to go visit his mother in prison so he can sell the reunion footage to a reality television show.  Donnie tracks down his son at the boss’ home the weekend of the wedding and causes many scenes of excruciating and un-funny mayhem.  The jokes about Donny and Vanilla Ice(!) having sex with an octogenarian and bother-sister incest(!) are idiotic enough, but Sandler’s need to portray his pustulant character as charming, lovable, and sexy is downright creepy.  At times, I amused myself by pretending it was a horror film.  That was as close to being amused as I got.

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Comedy

Opening This Week: It’s Back to the 80’s with “Rock of Ages” and “That’s My Boy”

Posted on June 14, 2012 at 11:57 am

Until VH1 recycles it’s “I Love the 80’s” series again, those homesick for the era have two choices opening in movie theaters this week that are both affectionate tributes to the era.  It makes sense — studio executives in their 40’s and 50’s came of age to the music of Bon Jovi, Guns n Roses, Def Leppard, Joan Jett, Jefferson Starship, Journey, and Foreigner, so the prospect of a juke-box musical like “Rock of Ages” is irresistible.  And Adam Sandler, whose movies are always in some way about the 80’s, populates his new film, “That’s My Boy,” with 80’s figures like Vanilla Ice, Tony Orlando, and Todd Bridges.  His character’s most meaningful gift to his son is a feather earring from a Loverboy concert.  Reviews of both will be posted in a few hours.

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Opening This Week
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