The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015. Remaining movies: 191 Days to go: 192
Movie #186: Mr. Deeds
I don’t get this movie at all. It’s supposed to be sweet but it falls pretty flat. It’s supposed to be funny but it’s not all that funny. And there are about a dozen plot points that never actually go anywhere.
Adam Sandler is Longfellow Deeds, a small town all-around nice guy who is the last living relative of billionaire Preston Blake (Harve Presnell). He inherits $40billion but for some reason he only gets it if he sells his shares of stock to the other board members of the company Blake owned. This part doesn’t make any sense, because the guy was obviously rich outside the company (he owns the New York Jets, for one, but that’ll come up later), but no explanation is given as to why he has to do this.
Winona Ryder plays Babe Bennett, a tabloid reporter for an Inside Edition-esque show who goes undercover as some helpless school nurse from Iowa in order to get close to Deeds. No idea why she has to do this either, but okay. She streaks her hair blonde for the purpose, though, so it must be really important. Of course, when footage leaks from their dates that only “Pam” AKA Babe could’ve taken, Deeds is completely dumbfounded as to how the tabloid show got it. He’s also apparently never read a book or seen a TV show, because Babe’s cover story is thin.
Now, Adam Sandler is dodgy enough in romantic comedies. I’ve only ever seen him successful in ones with Drew Barrymore, presumably because Drew is incredibly charming, the two have obvious affection for one another, and the pairing brings out the best things in Sandler. Winona Ryder, on the other hand, should not make romantic comedies. It’s not that she can’t be funny or that she isn’t an honestly talented actress, it’s just that she doesn’t have the particular type of comedy gene that works in romantic comedies — she’s not the right combination of sweet/jaded/wacky. If anything, Winona’s comedy genes are far more wry, erudite and self-deprecating, with a smattering of naiveté. It works in something like Mermaids or Beetlejuice or Heathers or even Reality Bites, but not in the kind of goofy-sweet films Adam Sandler attempts. It’s a poor combination.
Mr. Deeds features all sorts of odd casting, though. John Turturro is “very, very sneaky” butler Emilio, who is perhaps closer to Blake than anyone suspected — all possibilities of which are bizarre, no matter how you slice it. Peter Gallagher is ambiguously nefarious board member Chuck Cedar, who it is clear wants Deeds to sell his company shares for malicious purposes, but those purposes are never really clarified, nor is it clear why the acquisition of companies Cedar supposedly wants would require all the company’s fifty thousand current employees to be fired. But I guess conflict has to come from somewhere? It’s really dumb.
Conchata Ferrell is also around, mostly as a lovely friend and coworker from Deeds’s hometown, who near the end is needlessly turned into a punchline about having wanted to be a man. And Steve Buscemi wears horrible contact lenses that give him huge, wandering eyeballs that are frankly unsettling. But, boy is it hilarious when he doesn’t know where he’s looking! (Warning: Not hilarious at all.)
The movie is scattered and ambiguous at best, really. There’s the whole black foot Deeds got from “wicked bad frostbite” that is little more than an oddity on its own, but when seen in conjunction with Emilio’s foot fetish it’s as if the writers honestly couldn’t think of anything funnier than feet. Then there’s the Jets quarterback who comes in cussing about his contract, about which Deeds beats him up and then fires him, but nothing really comes of it at all except for the quarterback being forced to call and apologize by his father. It’s not a loose end, per se, but it feels like an incredibly elaborate set up for such a weak pay off. And of course, Chuck Cedar conspires with the tabloid show host (Jared Harris) to — do what, exactly? Expose that Pam is really Babe? I’m not sure how that’s supposed to help either the show or Chuck, but the movie paints it as if it does.
There is just time after time after time that the film makes incredibly dumb or nonsensical choices — even for a silly comedy engineered to be that way — and it honestly ruins the character of Longfellow Deeds who is actually a sweet, honorable and trusting man who is, truth be told, sort of a refreshing stretch for Sandler. Why the filmmakers would undermine that, though, is beyond me.
I don’t get this film at all, and I’m not sure why we have it.
Viable Option 