There are two things you need to know about “Grown Ups” before you even think about possibly seeing it. First, it stars “Saturday Night Live” alum Adam Sandler, who hasn’t been the least bit funny since he left that show so many years ago. Second, this film is directed by Dennis Dugan, whose other failures include “I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry,” “You Don’t Mess With the Zohan,” and “Big Daddy,” all starring Sandler (This list goes on, but I’ll try to spare him further humiliation). Long story short, when Sandler and Dugan get together for a project, it spells disaster.
“Grown Ups” begins with group of best friends on a basketball team who win a championship. Years later, they reunite for their coach’s funeral. Lenny Feder (Adam Sandler) is a big-time Hollywood agent. Eric Lamonsoff (Kevin James) is the co-owner of an automobile dealership. Kurt McKenzie (Chris Rock) is a stay-at-home husband. It’s not entirely clear what the other two friends, Marcus Higgins (David Spade) and Rob Hilliard (Rob Schneider), do exactly.
Those who have families have brought them along for a week-long stay at a cabin that they used to spend a lot of time at. Their activities range from joking around with each other to going to a water park to playing basketball. Supposedly they are using this time to have fun with their families and to reconnect with each other after not having seen each other for a long time, though it’s really hard to tell if that’s actually going on.
In the Sandler/Dugan tradition, we have yet another excruciatingly unfunny comedy featuring a level of humor that is so lowbrow and so juvenile that you wonder if it wasn’t written by elementary school kids. If that’s what you guessed, you wouldn’t be far off as it was written by Sandler and Fred Wolf (“Joe Dirt,” “Strange Wilderness”).
The movie’s other big problem is that there isn’t really much of a plot. What plot there is is merely an excuse to get all of these wacky people together so they can sit around cracking jokes to each other. It seemed as though someone was cracking a one-liner every 5-10 seconds, all of which fall flat. The funny thing is, even the actors seemed to realize that the material wasn’t that funny as they give each joke a really bland delivery.
I’ve never understood what charm or appeal Adam Sandler has. He did alright on SNL, but then, all of a sudden, he hit it big with a pair of mediocre films, “Billy Madison” and “Happy Gilmore.” Since then, he’s been continually starring in even more juvenile comedies, usually with a focus on scatological humor. The rest of the cast of “Grown Ups” is mostly filled out with has-beens, many of whom also got their start on SNL, but have simply faded away, like David Spade and Rob Schneider.
At 100 minutes, you can feel this movie drag on quite a bit, especially with the lack of plot, but mainly because the film is made up mostly of awkward situations and bad jokes. They even felt the need to through in another basketball game at the end between the same teams, but grown up. It is around this time that the writers decided to try an awkward tone shift.
After trying to be a comedy for more than 2/3 of its running time, out of nowhere, there’s a scene that feels very misplaced where several characters reveal secrets that they’ve been hiding from the others. Sadly, due to a complete lack of character development, there’s little reason to care about what they have to say, which can pretty much be said about the entirety of the dialogue of the film.
The title mainly leaves one wondering when Sandler will chose to finally grow up and stop starring in this ongoing series of terrible comedies. He could easily take a chance with better material, though it’s quite possible that since he co-wrote this film that he mistakenly thought it was decent. From looking at his filmography, it’s clear that Sandler is not the best judge of good material, which would go a long way towards explaining his current streak. That would actually explain quite a lot.
1.5/4 stars.
You can read this and other movie reviews in my column at The Richmond Examiner.