The Longest Yard

A remake of the 1971 classic starring Burt Reynolds, this more comedically-inclined rehash provides us with Adam Sandler in the lead role as an ex-football player, who is sent to jail for a variety of indiscretions. While in jail, the warden “asks” him to help the guards’ football team improve their game, and he does so, by organizing a match between them and a bunch of inmates. What ensues is supposed to be funny, I suppose, but I didn’t think so myself.

There wasn’t much about this film’s trailer that had done much to excite me to want to see it, and having spent a couple of hours with Sandler and his cohorts here, I can see that my instincts were pretty dead-on this time around. If you’re looking for a predictable, unoriginal, mediocre offering from the good folks over at Happy Madison, rent this puppy and switch your brain to “snooze” as the lack of any real funny moments, any obvious attempts at anything creative and any reason to remember this movie other than the fact that it was one of Sandler’s most lackluster offerings in years, will leave you feeling rather ho-hum and disappointed by the end. The film’s greatest letdown for me was the continued cinematic misuse of the very funny Chris Rock, who seems to have been tossed into this picture at the last minute, given no real character or script and asked to throw out as many of his own one-liners as possible. I’m sure that many of them will have some people chuckling, but I just found them sad, particularly since most of them felt dated including stuff like “Can’t we all just get along?” and “Run Forrest Run!“. Sandler wasn’t all that great either, with a standard performance that didn’t even come close to anything he’s put forth in comedic classics like HAPPY GILMORE or THE WEDDING SINGER. And as much as I love the guy, I just never really bought him as this supposed “sexy” hunk of a jock…just didn’t make sense visually.

But at the end of the day, it’s humor and story that would have kept me in this one, and neither one came through, with a bunch of rag-tag characters feeling like they belonged in a movie for 10-year olds (what was with that big moron guy who kept acting like a child every time he got hit? – “He broke-ded my nose”) and the plotline delivering about as many twists and turns as a porno. Granted, I laughed at a couple of little things here and there, like the “McAsshole” line and appreciated the presence of that huge Mexican dude who didn’t speak much, but other than that, the final game itself was tired, many of the jokes were “safe” and ultimately, for a movie starring Sandler and Rock, there simply wasn’t enough consistent humor to recommend to anyone who wants more from their movies then just the basics (the “cheerleaders” were also pretty dumb, and the guard’s estrogen joke just went on for too long). I don’t know, maybe this film was just made for a younger demographic. In the words of the great Danny Glover, maybe I’m just getting too old for this shit!! Even the soundtrack didn’t appeal much to me, and I generally enjoy that sort of thing. I do have to offer up a couple of points for Courtney Cox’s glorious cleavage though. I don’t know if they were real, fake or somewhere in between, but they looked great and for that alone…you gotta give it up to someone. Everything else in the movie, well…meh.

(c) 2021 Berge Garabedian