By Kevin McCarthy

I walked out of the theater legitimately angry that I had volunteered to sit through this movie.  I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU CHUCK AND LARRY is so terrible as to be mob-inducing.  It’s a formulaic, shallow, lazy bore of a movie that I pray only gets released on laser disc.  Honestly, film footage from this tasteless pap could have been featured in the brainwashing sequence in A CLOCKWORK ORANGE to great effect. If ever there was proof that Adam Sandler has squandered any semblance of comedic credit, it is this film. Go to hell, Little Nicky.  Please.

I’m going to run through the plot to this one. Try to keep up. Chuck Levine (Adam Sandler) and Larry Valentine (Kevin James) are two Brooklyn firefighters. Larry is a widower and somewhat lacking father to his two children, Eric and Tori. Chuck is the local (unconvincing) lothario and Larry’s best friend. After a near-fatal episode where Larry saves Chuck’s life, the former begins to worry about the welfare of his children should his job claim his life. Larry then discovers a loophole by which he can make sure his children are taken care of, and he uses his leverage over Chuck to cajole him into joining him in a civil union. The “couple” is investigated for insurance fraud and lawyer Alex McDonough (Jessica Biel) is called in to defend them. The rest of the movie plays out exactly as you would expect it to — complete with gay jokes followed by tolerance speeches, deceived love interests, and of course, the final BIG DADDY-esque courtroom scene. CHUCK AND LARRY brings nothing new to the discourse or the genre.  There is no emotional connection to the characters. Oh, and it’s not funny.

This is the kind of mundane gay humor that the basic cable networks skate by with on prime time (Kevin James comes straight from CBS’s THE KING OF QUEENS, for crying out loud).  It’s like someone took the worst 1994 SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE skit and turned it into a movie.

As a good friend of mine said last week, the day Adam Sandler dies, Rob Schneider will be homeless. When I laughed, it was usually in disbelief over how far Sandler has fallen. The one exception is Nick Swardson, who I’ve gushed over in the past. Unfortunately his performance here is no different than we’ve seen on RENO 911! or heard on previous Sandler albums. Sure, there are some decent cameos courtesy of Dave Matthews, Dan Patrick and Lance Bass — and Steve Buscemi is always a delight — but an hour after seeing CHUCK AND LARRY, it’s already starting to fade from my consciousness and I’m left only with the outrage of how entirely useless the film is. 

Envisioned as a gay romantic comedy, we’re basically treated to shades of the stars’ past performances — awkward white guy dancing, MR. MOM moments, random brawling, guy-on-guy kissing — ad nauseum.  While Jessica Biel is admittedly charming here, her role doesn’t call for much more than playing the object of lust for the numerous man-children who populate the film and its audience. At this point, it pains me to say that this joyless crap may be all we see out of Sandler from now on. It’s a shame, considering his Happy Madison Productions has produced some good material with friends in, for example, GRANDMA’S BOY.

I often lament my failure to reflect on a more intellectual level the themes that films represent. The callousness of capitalist culture in HOSTEL: PART II, for example. But, I think I’ll rest easy having chosen not to engage I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU CHUCK AND LARRY on an intellectual level.  And, it’s not because I’m giving it allowances for being a comedy or a “wide appeal” film.  I just don’t think the tired humor and lazy plot progression can stand up to any more scrutiny than the five sentences I allotted above.  In simplest terms, this movie sucks.