Happy Gilmore (1996)

Happy Gilmore (1996)

 3/10

 Starring

Adam Sandler

Christopher McDonald

Julie Bowen

Carl Weathers

 

Directed by Dennis Dugan

 

There is one part of my movie-watching life that never seems to add up: I have never seen Adam Sandler’s Happy Gilmore. I decided to watch it, and honestly, I wish I never did. I cannot deter you enough from seeing this movie. It’s horrible, boring, and not funny at all. The short-tempered Happy (Adam Sandler) is annoying, childish, and as the movie carried on, I kept wondering how he was the good guy. His character sucked so much that they had to write his antagonist to step out of line so much for him to be classified as the bad guy, instead of the man who does not want a joke to ruin the game he loves.

What made this movie the champ that launched Sandler’s path went over my head.

The movie follows the life of short-tempered Happy, who wanted to be a hockey player at all costs. Happy’s dream of being a hockey player took over his life to the point that nothing else mattered, except for his grandmother. His antics and his temper were so childish, it felt like watching a five-year-old.

There is an aspect of the movie-watching world that finds this funny, and I wish I could understand how. How do you enjoy the exaggerated, unrealistic behavior of a man-child?

Happy had one hell of a slap shot; he could hit a hockey puck and make it travel miles. He found out he could make some money swindling people, so he took his hitting game to a golf driving range to swindle more people. It was there that Happy met golf trainer and former pro golfer Chubbs (Carl Weathers), who wanted to train him to be a pro-golfer himself. But when Happy heard he could make money by entering a golf tournament, he went after the cash to save his grandmother’s home from foreclosure. From there, the movie took a nosedive from manageable to the point of annoyingly ridiculous. The game of golf had to tolerate this annoying character, and somehow, he became a superstar.

Then there’s the love interest, who decides to fall for Happy, a man who has no control of his temper. It wasn’t that the bar was lowered by that annoying antagonist—far from it; the antagonist wanted nothing to do with her romantically. It was just Happy whom she fell for.

This made it look more like she had a problem and only wanted to be with men who were too childish to take control of their own life.

There are better Adam Sandler movies out there, which I saw back when I was younger and some that I can even point to now, and this is not one of them.