PLOT: A former NFLer ends up in jail where he's recruited by the warden to assemble a football team to play the guards.
It's not often I come away from an Adam Sandler movie wanting to thank the guy. But I've got two props to give him after seeing his remake of The Longest Yard.
First, thanks for not desecrating my favourite Burt Reynolds movie the way you did Gary Cooper and Mr. Deeds. Sandler and director Peter Segal "got" the Robert Aldrich original, and mostly stayed true to the essential hilarity of a bunch of cons making the most of a wholesome excuse to unleash their repressed violence on some brutal law enforcement goons.
Second, thanks for reminding me what an underrated actor Burt actually was. The story of Paul Crewe, a jailed ex-NFLer who's coerced into assembling a team of convicts to play the guards, isn't a hugely taxing acting job. But it does have one moment of epiphany -- that "screw it" moment when Crewe decides to forego self-interest and refuses to betray his teammates. It's the kind of moment expressed in tiny movements on an actor's face, and one Reynolds pulled off so easily you didn't think about it. Sandler, on the other hand, is a cipher, as fixed in expression at that moment as any other.
No biggie. It's just interesting to consider a time when even out-and-out gagfests had minimal expectations of acting and plot.
On the other hand, I don't hold it against Sandler that he's not as convincing a football player. Burt was once drafted by the Colts, for cryin' out loud. (It's disconcerting to see our hero dwarfed by the warden, though, played by James Cromwell).
All of this doesn't matter much, since The Longest Yard is about Paul Crewe as much as The Bob Newhart Show was about Bob. It's really about the "characters" he's surrounded with. And this new version makes the most of that, to the point of casting another apparent acromegalic giant as a scary sight gag a la the original's Richard Kiel. A lot of tough guys prove they can sort of act in this movie, including wrestlers Stone Cold Steve Austin, Bill Goldberg and Kevin Nash and NFLer Michael Irvin.
Crewe's "crew," as it were, are played by Chris Rock, in full quip machine mode as Caretaker, and Reynolds himself on jovial auto-pilot as the geriatric ex NFLer Nate Scarborough.
The real question, of course, is what does a remake bring to the table. The hip-hop tone is a legit update (a game of "streetball" is integral to gaining the respect of the black inmates), and for some reason, someone thought it would be hilarious to play up what passes for prison sex with a bunch of drag queen characters (not Tracy Morgan's finest thespian moment) and have Cloris Leachman play the warden's horny secretary.
It registers as a better comedy than the recent British soccer remake with Vinnie Jones. But still, do yourself a favour and rent the original at some point.
(This film is rated PG)
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