Comedy-drama that doesn't hold together

Rating: 4/10 (10 July 2006)

In "Click," Adam Sandler plays a put-upon architect too busy trying to become partner in his firm to pay attention to his wife (Kate Beckinsdale) and two adorable kids.
Already stretched to the breaking point by the demands of work and family, Sandler is set off by his inability to find, among the many that litter his house, the remote control that turns on his TV.
In one of the more blatant corporate tie-ins in recent movie history, Sandler, in a huff, heads to Bed, Bath, & Beyond to buy a universal remote to control all the functions of his TV, DVD, etc. (Nevermind the question of why he would go to to a store that so obviously sells sheets, towels, and housewares for an electronic device. He goes to B,B, & Beyond because Best Buy probably wouldn't pony up the cash for a movie tie-in)
At the store, he meets Christopher Walken, playing the one-note goofy-creepy character he's been doing in these kinds of movies for a decade now, who gives him a shiny "universal" remote. Sandler gets the remote control home and soon learns the pause, fast forward, mute, and other buttons work on his dog, wife, children, and life.
The movie has some fun and gets genuine laughs as Sandler uses the fast forward feature to get through foreplay with his wife, the mute button on his dog, and the pause button to get revenge on his smarmy boss (David Hasselhoff).
Unfortunately, Sandler runs out of clever things to do with the remote control, and the movie lurches into its second, darker half. The laughs disappear, and the movie, in its "A Christmas Carol" phase, becomes somber and heavy-handed.
There is one scene that is actually unsettling and proves Christopher Walken's creepiness hasn't been completely filed down.
Still, this is an Adam Sandler movie and the darkness drops like a hammer onto a movie that had Sandler mount his boss's desk and fart in his face for a solid 5 seconds. The funny stuff is mediocre-Adam Sandler and the serious stuff doesn't jell with it. The movie meanders in the second half until finally coming to a weak ending.
The actors give the material a go and everybody plays their part. Sandler reprises his jerk-who-has-forgotten-what's-truly-important role, Walken does his schtick, and some of the actors that appear in all of Sandler's films appear to play their one-note roles.
In the formula that undergirds nearly all of Sandler's movies, the female love interest plays an important and often under-appreciated role. Though Sandler is front and center and the butt or teller of all jokes, his movies need a strong female presence to provide ballast. Sandler's long past the days of "The Waterboy" and "Happy Gilmore," when he could create and inhabit a character so goofy and watchable and walk him through a cliché-ridden story that you could throw any pretty woman next to him. (Julie Bowen, anybody?)
There's a reason why "The Wedding Singer" and "50 First Dates" work and "Little Nicky" and "Mr Deeds" don't. It's the girl, stupid. (In particular, Drew Barrymore. Why aren't these two married?)
Unfortunately, Kate Beckinsdale has no chemistry with Sandler. She seems to have wondered in from another, more glamorous movie. You see her making sandwiches in the kitchen, but you don't believe that she's ever made a sandwich in her life. You learn that she's a stay at home mom with two kids. You see the home and the two kids, but Beckinsdale acts like she can't wait for the director to yell "Cut!" so she can get these rugrats away from her.
It doesn't help that the movie has her gaze at the camera with lingerie-catalogue eyes and show off her rail-thin body in microscopic tee-shirt-and-boxer combinations. She sports a shag hairdo that's straight out of $1,000-a-hairstyle salon and, in all her scenes, is lit with a heavenly light. No housewife looks this good, no actual woman looks this good, no-body looks this good-- Without an army of wardrobe and makeup people. Such a phony character is out of place alongside the believably slobby Sandler and the everyday-people-looking actors playing the two kids.
You can't fault Beckinsdale for the way she looks. But you can for what she does with the material. She plays the role with an earnestness that it doesn't deserve. She's trying to sell the audience the domestic complications that it knows are all part of the formula. She also misplays the few quirks her character is given and is at her most believable when fighting with Sandler.
Though Beckinsdale is the most glaring problem, she is not the only one. We never know what to make of Hasselhoff as Sandler's boss. Is he demanding and insensitive? Sometimes. Is he a good-natured schlub like Sandler? Sometimes. In another movie this might be called complexity. In a movie like "Click," populated with types instead of characters, it's uncertainty.
Sandler, too, isn't entirely believable as an architect. His character must have gone to the Mike Brady school of architecture. In this age in which computer-aided drafting has become standard, Sandler is shown using ruler and pencil. Maybe 20 years ago. The movie doesn't know enough about architects to portray one. Architect like advertising executive or magazine editor, has become(or maybe always was) one of those all-purpose movie-jobs.
Overall, "Click" is like the similarly high-concept, hi-jincks-ensue movie as "50 First Dates" with fewer laughs and lacking an actress game enough for the material.