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With the tagline "Boys will be boys.. some longer than others" this already sounds like yet another excuse for Adam Sandler and his comedic chronies to start behaving like children… again. Cue the endless wee-wee and fart jokes?

Well not quite, but be prepared to set your annoyance to high and comedy expectations to low based on previous Sandler outings. The premise this time around is the reunion of members of a kids’ basketball team many years later after the death of their coach. With a disappointing 5.8 rating from the public on imdb, and a damning 10% rating from the critics on Rotten Tomatoes can this "good times" comedy vehicle really be that bad?

<Overly sentimental, saccharine film music plays in background>
Reverend conducting funeral service: Coach Robert "The Buzzer" Fernando was a caretaker by profession. What a wonderful word that is to describe his devotion to his fellow man. He truly took care. When Robert knew that his time was short he told me there was one specific man he wanted to say a few words to memorialize him. So I’d like to ask Lenny Feder to come up now.
Lenny Feder: I’m sorry; I’m not prepared at all. I feel very honoured that coach asked me to do this, but .. I also feel terrible because I haven’t seen the coach in so long. And he always wanted me to come to town and see him and I got caught up in what I’ve been doing and I regret it. I understand that the St Mark’s team of 1978 was the only championship team that the coach ever had and that’s very impressive I gotta say judging from the talent we had to offer. I mean, believe it or not Robbie and Marcus were actually shorter back in 1978.
<Congregation laughs loudly>
Eric Lamonsoff: But those guys had a skill you never mastered. They knew how to pass the ball.
<Congregation laughs even louder>
Lenny: Looks like somebody has to learn how to pass the Kentucky Fried Chicken.
<Congregation laughs. Overweight Lenny is not amused >
Lenny: We’re saying goodbye to a big part of our lives. All of us. You affected everybody in this room. And I hope we get to live our lives like you. Have no regrets when life’s final buzzer sounds. So let’s all bow our heads in silence.

Aww! Gets you right there doesn’t it?! That was Adam Sandler playing rich Hollywood agent Lenny Feder, making possibly the only funny joke in the movie at an overweight Kevin James expense there. As the film continues the former players and their partners and familes hang out together at a lake house for a weekend and just muse about their lives.

And that’s the real problem with the film. Nothing much happens other than a bunch of past-it comedic writers sitting around and "hanging out" with their unfeasibily beautiful other halves. There’s a few basic jokes: a "big black momma" grandmother who farts, a four year-old who hasn’t been weaned, the fact that Kevin James is fat and two of the other guys are short. But these same "jokes" are repeated endlessly and there’s only so many times you can fake a weak smile at any of them.

You can imagine the cast turning up on a Monday, asking to see the latest version of the script.

Adam Sandler: I’m sorry, I’m not prepared at all.

And on Tuesday.

Adam Sandler: I’m sorry, I’m not prepared at all.

And by Friday, it’s still…

Adam Sandler: I’m sorry, I’m not prepared at all.

The problem is with no actual script, and a cast seemingly incapable of writing what could the film-makers do? Shut up shop and go home? Not when there’s a 200 million pound box office profit up for grabs for just an 80 million dollar "budget" on the table. There’s been enough precedent set on these formulaic Hollywood films that the profit/earnings ratio can be predicted long before a script even thought of, let alone written down on paper.

And with enough marketing: "Heh we can get Chris Rock to fly to the UK and promote it with Adam and the rest of the cast. That’ll put the required bums on seats. Let’s just wing it"

It’s just depressing that almost the entire 80 million dollars appears to have been spent on salary, which just fattens the wallets and already over-inflated egos of a small group of principal players who are well past their "Sell by" date, at least when it comes to writing and performing stuff that actually makes people laugh. A couple of million for an actual writer wouldn’t have cut too much into profits, and might have actually guaranteed the viewers at least a couple of laughs?

One reviewer on imdb advises that you’d be better off lighting a candle and watching it burn, rather than wasting time on this film, and honestly it’s hard to disagree.

But at least the cast aren’t so self-delusional that they don’t feel guilty about charging so much whilst failing to deliver. At least that’s my reading of why they feel they have to guffaw with hilarity or high-five each other every time one of their members speaks a line, regardless of whether the line is intended to be funny or not. It’s as if they feel so bad that they figure if they pretend what they’re doing really is hilarious then maybe they’ll get away with the con trick they’ve pulled in trailing this movie and that maybe folks might get to think this stuff really is funny.

Marcus Higgins : Who’s that girl? That’s not a nanny is it?
Lenny: No, no, this is a friend of ours from China
Marcus: Oh yeah. No, I’ve been on that website
Lenny: No, no, no, no. Like an exchange student that.. My wife brought her into the house.
Marcus: Oh, your wife’s into chicks. Oh, that’s nice.
Lenny: Hollywood
Kurt McKenzie: Hollywood!
Lenny: Just an exchange student.
Kurt: I always thought something like that…
<Eric Lamonsoff and family pull up in an open top Cadillac>
Eric: Hey, now.
Lenny: Lamonsoff! Rolling up in a Caddy?
Eric: That’s how we do it!
Lenny: And you, you’ve grown up on me, man. Are you a B-cup now? <laughter>
Eric: Hey, nice ears. You get the NFL package on those? <more laughter>
Kurt: Nice Caddy. You selling lawn furniture and crack?
Eric: Come on, I’m the co-owner of Branchville Lawn Furniture, man.
Kurt: Glad you brought your mother this time. <laughter> Eric: Oh, that’s a good one <much high-fiving and laughter> Wow. It’s like shaking hands with an Eagle. I’ll see you later <much more laughter>

The Blu-Ray itself features a nice transfer, and thankfully saturated colours – none of that digital grading desaturation or colour-coercion nonsense here. There’s a commentary, including subtitles, with director Dennis Dugan, 10 minutes of outtakes and deleted scenes, about six four minute featurettes that just have the cast constantly telling us how hilarious they are and endlessly laughing at their own lines. I can see why one’s called "Gag reel" because I wanted to gag all the way through it the cast are so up themselves.

Copyright © 2011. Ian Smith (Irascian Ltd), London. UK. Refer to our web site at UKBluRayReview.com for more information.