This will likely be the worst movie I’ve ever seen. It may well be the last movie I ever see. Please, universe. Please don’t let a fucking Sandler movie kill me two days before The Force Awakens.
Twelve seconds in and the Happy Madison logo flashes, and I am filled with dread.
We’re shown an angry Native American and a cockeyed Steve Zahn. Except the Native American is Sandler, who says “I just dress like this so I don’t get scalped out on the prairie”, so we’re off to a rousing start.
A group of cowboys just referred to a woman as “a sweet piece of red prairie meat”.
They just desperately tried to ape the “Camptown ladies” dancing scene from Blazing Saddles. Swing and a miss so bad it should count for two strikes. Then they did their version of Gene Wilder’s gunslinging bit, except it’s Sandler doing goofy martial arts at light speed. If this is just going to be recycled jokes from better-made satire, this is gonna be a long fucking night.
So the premise is that Sandler is a white man named “White Knife” raised by Indians and is some sort of super badass. Yup. The “sweet piece of prairie meat” is his girlfriend and is named “Smoking Fox”, which isn’t on the nose at all. I’m already fucking miserable.
Turns out his long lost father is Nick Nolte. Perfect.
Nolte wants him to help find his long lost fortune. Do these people realize that clichés do not count as comedy? That you still have to actually write a movie? With a plot?
There’s another native woman named “Never Wears Bra” so we’re on a fucking roll with the blatant sexism and objectification.
Danny Trejo is here, because Danny Trejo will literally act in anything. He’s the Michael Caine of shitty movies. He’s the head of a gang that kidnaps Papa Nolte to go find and steal his treasure.
And now, because this isn’t painful enough, Rob Schneider playing a Mexican stereotype (and Sandler’s half-brother). This film is almost literally becoming a hate crime.
The brotherly reunion scene is punctuated with a donkey having explosive diarrhea. No reason. No prompting. Just explosive diarrhea. Thanks, Sandler, you rabidly ignorant fuck. I just watched ten seconds of donkey diarrhea for money, and when you find yourself typing sentences like that, you seriously have to start questioning your life choices.
Taylor Lautner shows up during a bank robbery as the village idiot. Like I said, the humor’s more than a little on the nose. He is also their half brother. Oh did I forget to mention that the premise is that Sandler is getting a band together to rescue his father, comprised entirely of his half brothers? Because that’s the plot. That’s the entire plot.
The donkey just shit on the bank manager. HUMOR! COMIN’ AT YA! Sandler doesn’t grasp that you can’t just take a genre trope and add poop or urine or a funny actor. You actually have to write a joke that inverts the trope. That’s how satire works. Instead, he somehow thinks it’s just “western cliche + dick/fart/poop joke = satire”
The donkey is now fellating Lautner. I’m not even going to explain the plot anymore because, well, there isn’t one. Let’s just bask in the horrific stupidity and marvel in the fact that is supposed to somehow be satire.
What’s most remarkable, thus far, is that this movie? Is incredibly fucking boring. I mean staggeringly boring. It’s bad enough that it’s not even remotely funny and that it’s crudely and stupidly offensive, but boring too? It’s like the garbage trifecta.
The next brother is Jorge Garcia, playing some sort of feral mute hairball.
The cowboy gang (called the Left Eye gang because they all cut out one eye to become members) just kidnapped Sandler’s fiancée, as if that’s something I should care about.
The next two brothers show up, played by Luke Wilson (a drunk) and Terry Crews (a big-dicked piano player), and with the appearance of Crews, I feel the first real pang of disappointment. Why, Terry? Why would you do us like that? Wilson hasn’t had a career in a decade, but you? Weren’t we talking about you in contention for Luke Cage just a little while ago?
So just so we’re clear, here’s the lineup:
Sandler is White Guy Raised By Native Americans Brother.
Scheider is Gross Mexican Stereotype Brother
Garcia is Gross Hairy Mute Brother
Lautner is Idiot Virgin Who Likes To Fuck Things Brother
Crews is Black Big-Dicked Brother
Wilson is Drunk Brother
And me? I’m just filled with hate and sadness, brother.
For reasons you don’t need to understand, Schneider just cut off Harvey Keitel’s head with a shovel, and now there’s a musical interlude as the six brothers are sing a song called “When We Meet Dad”. It’s even less funny than it sounds. I want to set myself on fire.
John Turturro? Et tu, Joey Knish?
Turturro is part of an over-long, elaborate joke where he’s trying to get them to play a game (baseball) where he makes up the rules as he goes along. It’s an interesting premise for a joke - that the rules are so cryptic that they must have been made up at random - but it’s executed so god awfully that it lacks anything resembling humor or nuance (oh and they’re playing against a bunch of Chinese men who speak in stereotypes). Basically it’s a microcosm for this whole piece of shit movie.
My wife just sat down with me, watched two minutes and solemnly whispered “I’m so sorry.” This is how I know she loves me.
It’s also how I know Dustin hates me.
I blacked out for a second and now Lautner is being hung, but apparently his neck is so strong that- oh fuck it. Fuck you. Fuck everything.
So the no eye gang, or whatever the hell they’re called, just stole all their money, rendering everything up to this point moot. So we’re basically starting the movie over, and I’m starting to feel like Baby-O in Con Air. I got a bad feeling, son. I’m feeling like maybe I’m not supposed to make it. All I can think about is like… there ain’t no God, like he don’t exist. WHERE IS BARBIE-HAIR NIC CAGE TO SAVE MY LIFE, HUH? FUCK YOU, CAMERON POE.
I might be starting to crack a little. Can I just shut this off, drink a fifth of whiskey and watch Blazing Saddles for the 10,000th time? No? Fuck you. I hope your whole family gets boiled in oil. I hope someone jams a lamprey into your colon.
There was just a pointless flashback where Luke Wilson regaled them with the story of how he was Lincoln’s bodyguard. Ha. Ha. Get it?
Anyway, now they’re about to knock over a poker game.
Jon Lovitz. Now we get Jon Lovitz. And he’s joined by General Custer (David Spade) and Mark Twain, who is played by… Vanilla Ice. Hand to god. Vanilla Ice. Just so we’re clear, Happy Madison, casting is not humor. You can incorporate clever casting into a joke, BUT THERE HAS TO BE AN ACTUAL FUCKING JOKE.
Blake Shelton is Wyatt Earp. So there’s that.
I would rather eat a bowl of human fingernails than finish this movie.
They just made a joke about Home Alone, except that they actually said the words “Home Alone”. Sigh.
By the way? This movie currently has an average viewer rating of four stars on Netflix. Four. Stars. This is why they hate us. Who’s they? Everyone. Including myself.
OK, big showdown, Trejo gets killed, family reunion, thank fuck this is over. Now I can go weep softly until sleep or death takes me, I don’t care which one.
Goddamnit, this isn’t over yet.
Now there’s a double cross and Nolte is actually the bad guy and there’s a bomb and all I feel is a cold hatred for the universe. The next time I see Dustin I’m going to hit him in the balls. With my car.
Mrs. TK just looked at me with an expression of pure despair. Between this, Human Centipede and that fucking Kirk Cameron movie, it’s a miracle that we’re still married.
OK, it appears to be over. There’s a wedding happening, and Vanilla Ice is dancing and Terry Crews is playing the piano with his dick. That’s as good a place as anywhere to end this nightmare.
I asked Mrs. TK what was the worst movie she’s had to watch with me for this stupid job, and she didn’t even draw a breath before saying this one. She’s right. She’s so right.
Goodnight, and know this: If you found any joy at all in this, I hope you choke on fire ants.