Boob tube friendly. Just Go With It is another Adam Sandler bannered Happy Madison production and just like his others is ridiculous and strays fast from reality, but sometimes there is a certain doofus quality that helps you gets in touch with your inner smiling idiot. That’s not always the worst thing in the world. Sandler is plastic surgeon Danny, but really another role as a womanizer who is a fuddy duddy deep down. He falls madly for Palmer (Brooklyn Decker, Playboy material) in one night and he has his loyal friend Katherine (Jennifer Aniston) accompany him in a series of designer lies to keep the courtship going. Yes, you can see Sandler and Aniston from the start are going to be these two old friends who find out maybe they’re made for each other. All of them end up in Hawaii. Even then it’s TV compact, not big screen acclimate.
You get lots of plastic surgery sight gags. The funniest are Rachel Dratch with a runaway eyebrow and Kevin Nealon with a face so tight he can’t aim a straw into his mouth. Then you get lots of humor of the crude guy (Nick Swardson), who goes from the name change from Eddie to Dolph Lundgren (from “Rocky IV”), always referring to his surgery-enhanced erectile enlargement. Then you got a pair of cute kids who blackmail Sandler in agreement that they will pretend to be his kids.
Danny was a womanizer you see who has spent 15 years picking up women by pretending to be unhappily married. But he needs to prove to Palmer, after some tangled lies, they he is on the road to divorce. Aniston has a good time faking feisty-bitchiness and the result can occasionally be feisty fun. Nicole Kidman surprisingly has a substantial competitive bitch role (musician Dave Matthews plays her rich and snivelling husband). Much can be forgotten from a typical Happy Madison production but there is a Coconut Kiss competition between Aniston and Kidman that is humorously spry – I’d buy that scene again for a dollar. It’s a long story but there is an intercut scene with Eddie giving a sheep CPR. Always the un-necessities with Sandler movies!
Happy Madison productions obviously refuse to cater to the critical establishment so why be surprised by that? They are the movie equals to greasy spoon food. At least it has relatively decent craftsmanship – there are Sandler movies that are so misshapen and overlong that they grind on. This comedy, as stupid as it is, has a slippery flow. Although it is typically badly constructed crock: Danny falls for Palmer way too fast and without enough establishing scenes of them in love. One morning after scene doesn’t convince. The chemistry is there, really there predictably, between Danny and Katherine. (Can you imagine that gullible dimwits among the mass audiences that won’t see this coming. They gasp! They always gasp! Overdone formula is a shock to them!)
It would be all too easy to join the bandwagon of Adam Sandler haters. Of course his stuff is stupid and below par of real adult realism. Past the prejudice, I kind of like the youthful spirit of him. I just like him way better when he stars in other movies that are not under his production company banner. This is a fairly OK Valentine’s Weekend programmer that is actually a little better than previous saccharine Valentine’s Weekend openers of recent years. Built to entertain 12-year olds in the audience, too.
110 Minutes. Rated PG-13.
COMEDY / MINDLESS FUN / DRUNKEN SATURDAY AFTER DARK CUDDLE MOVIE
Film Cousins: “Big Daddy” (1999); “Legally Blonde” (2001); “50 First Dates” (2004); “The House Bunny” (2008).
