"Somebody's Closer!"

Rating: 6/10 (13 February 2005)

When you buy an Adam Sandler movie, you're buying a brand, usually you know what you're going to get. Simple humor, occasionally funny voices, a regular guy doing something great, either on a big stage event, or merely passing high school. Happy Gilmore may be the most consistently funny of the Adam Sandler movies as a failed hockey player finds out he can hit a golf ball 350 yards and tries to earn enough money to buy back his beloved grandmother's house from the IRS. Simple plot, surrounded by funny performances from Carl Weathers (Apollo Creed from the Rocky movies) as golf teacher Chubbs and Christopher McDonald as the smug professional golfer Shooter McGavin. And just for fun, Lee Trevino makes brief, and funny, appearances throughout the film. The signature scene of the film is when Happy Gilmore (Sandler) plays golf with Bob Barker (yes, that Bob Barker from The Price Is Right) get into a fistfight over who is play golf well or not. It would have been in poor taste if Happy were to beat up Barker, but since it goes the other way around, it has a certain comic genius to it and saves what could have been an uncomfortable moment. The golf highlights are all long shots and fancy editing, Gimore slices almost every tee shot, but through the magic of movies, we don't see that happening. It's funny throughout the movie, not laugh out loud funny from start to finish, but there are a lot of chuckles, the story is cute, and it is not as crude as other Sandler movies are. It's sweet, cute, and most importantly, funny enough to maintain the entertainment value all the way through.