Review: Punch-Drunk Love (VHS)
April 25, 2004; Matt's Living Room (Maine)
* * * 1/2
I missed this the first time around and have passed on borrowing it a few times from Jay, but finally rented it with a friend last night to kill some initial home-from-college boredom. Granted, Punch-Drunk Love is not what anyone expects from Adam Sandler, but no one ever said that was a bad thing either.
Instead of his usual fare of bathroom humor and over-the-top cartoonish violence, Sandler gives a performance that makes me wonder why he's been wasting his time on low-brow crap for the past few years. His Barry Egan is similar to Happy Gilmore or Billy Madison, but the difference is that while in all his other movies the camera rolls until he breaks something (giving the oh-so-"funny" punchline), here director Paul Thomas Anderson lets the camera roll to see what happens to Egan after he messes up; it shows how he deals with it, and it shows Egan as a character who doesn't want to be that way, but he can't stop because he really doesn't like who he is.
What allows him to stop is his relationship with Lena Leonard (Emily Watson); he finds someone he can truly care about and it gives him a reason to pick up his life and put it back together. Nevermind that this relationship is pretty messed up - Egan tells her that her face is so beautiful, he wants to smash it in with a sledehammer - the point is that each character cures the other of a loneliness they had yet to find a way out of. This is a crystal-clear proclamation of the inspirational power of love: Egan drags himself out of a massive hole he's fallen into between his sisters and an extortion attempt, and there's no way he could have done it without meeting and falling for Lena. Their relationship could be a tough sell - the movie is barely an hour and a half, and their first date doesn't come until 40 minutes in, but Sandler and Watson both pour themselves into it entirely, and make it completely convincing.
This is a step for Sandler - he progresses beyond the amoral jerks with hearts of gold he tends towards, but he's still playing entirely awkward and uncomfortable in any social situation. He's good at it, but now that he's shown he can do more than people expect, it's getting near time to expand on that and show how much more. Nevertheless, this is a good, real little romance that is sold by the two stars.
April 25, 2004; Matt's Living Room (Maine)
* * * 1/2
I missed this the first time around and have passed on borrowing it a few times from Jay, but finally rented it with a friend last night to kill some initial home-from-college boredom. Granted, Punch-Drunk Love is not what anyone expects from Adam Sandler, but no one ever said that was a bad thing either.
Instead of his usual fare of bathroom humor and over-the-top cartoonish violence, Sandler gives a performance that makes me wonder why he's been wasting his time on low-brow crap for the past few years. His Barry Egan is similar to Happy Gilmore or Billy Madison, but the difference is that while in all his other movies the camera rolls until he breaks something (giving the oh-so-"funny" punchline), here director Paul Thomas Anderson lets the camera roll to see what happens to Egan after he messes up; it shows how he deals with it, and it shows Egan as a character who doesn't want to be that way, but he can't stop because he really doesn't like who he is.
What allows him to stop is his relationship with Lena Leonard (Emily Watson); he finds someone he can truly care about and it gives him a reason to pick up his life and put it back together. Nevermind that this relationship is pretty messed up - Egan tells her that her face is so beautiful, he wants to smash it in with a sledehammer - the point is that each character cures the other of a loneliness they had yet to find a way out of. This is a crystal-clear proclamation of the inspirational power of love: Egan drags himself out of a massive hole he's fallen into between his sisters and an extortion attempt, and there's no way he could have done it without meeting and falling for Lena. Their relationship could be a tough sell - the movie is barely an hour and a half, and their first date doesn't come until 40 minutes in, but Sandler and Watson both pour themselves into it entirely, and make it completely convincing.
This is a step for Sandler - he progresses beyond the amoral jerks with hearts of gold he tends towards, but he's still playing entirely awkward and uncomfortable in any social situation. He's good at it, but now that he's shown he can do more than people expect, it's getting near time to expand on that and show how much more. Nevertheless, this is a good, real little romance that is sold by the two stars.
posted by Matt S. at
1:26 PM
