I think Mike and Jay are asking a bigger question – what is a “movie”, exactly, as opposed to say, a commercial – and suggesting that Adam Sandlar’s productions have crossed over a sort of invisible line – that they aren’t really movies anymore, at least in any traditional sense. Instead, they’ve become “movie-like product-placement cash-generating commercial ventures”. They’re commenting more on how utterly soulless and pointless the whole process has become, and sort of making an “emperor has no clothes” statement by stripping down **Jack and Jill **to it’s most basic elements. In that sense, they’ve gone a bit beyond the purview of a general movie reviewer, who usually confines himself/herself to what’s on the screen. I think their disgust for what they percieve Adam Sandler to be doing drove them to draw a line in the sand.
Beside the investors who cares how much the movie cost to make? It’s not like these costs are passed onto ticket prices.
If Adam Sandler makes a crappy movie for $15 million a person buying a ticket will pay $10. If Adam Sandler makes the same movie for $90 million the ticket still costs $10.
Basically the argument they make seems to boil down to Sandler makes too much money and you should feel outraged about it because his movies are just commercials that you are paying to watch.
They completely don’t care whether or not you actually enjoy watching his movies/commercials, they just don’t feel like he deserves it.
I think the first part is beside the point. Sure, they point out that Sandler makes a lot of money, but the key point is: his movies are just commercials that you are paying to watch.
You did a nice job of summarizing there, I wish the author of the article cited in the OP had been as concise and direct.
I think they’re arguing that Sandler shouldn’t be allowed to make movies at all since they see little talent. But what would fill that space? Wouldn’t the movie-going public just flock to Chris Kattan or Rob Schneider movies instead?
Most TV, movies and music are deadful in my opinion, but they do fabulously well while my favorites gather dust. It’s difficult to declare someone’s taste as bad when I’m the one in the minority.
I have a theory on Adam Sandler movies. The quality of the movie is inversely proportional to how many times he talks in that stupid, inane, chalkboard scratching, squeaky kid voice.
F*** It… I take that back. I don’t like any of his movies any more. The last one I enjoyed was Happy Gilmore (who, I might add, had a hot-as-usual Julie Bowen in the cast).
I wish someone could post two consecutive minutes of Adam Sandler performing that are, in the poster’s opinion, tolerable.
Performing the role of kindling at Burning Man, perhaps.
That is the thing. He can act. Punch Drunk Love and Funny People prove that he knows the other movies are shit.
Punch-Drunk Love is one of my favorite movies. He wasn’t bad in Reign Over Me, though I didn’t like it enough to watch it more than once. But I can’t stand other movies of his… **Happy Gilmore **was pretty funny though. 
Click was his attempt to make a movie with some substance and drama, but failed.
Click was his The Truman Show.
The Truman Show was a GREAT movie IMHO. Click is not at all comparable. :dubious:
edit: Just not even close.
I was having the same reaction at the beginning. Like “wait, you’re saying his avoidance of all these cliches is a bad thing?”. But it becomes obvious that the argument is about why the movie avoids the cliches - not because of artistic integrity but to save money. It wouldn’t be worth the time if this was simply another one of 1000s of formula comedies. The review suggests something quite more nefarious at work.
I’m not sure yet if that is the accurate way to look at it, but I found the review very interesting to say the least.
It reminds me a bit of the way people have ripped on Grace Slick for “We Built this City on Rock and Roll”. No one ever claims that rock musicians don’t want to sell records, or make money. But having an artistic vision, or expressing something that you hope people will appreciate enough to buy is one thing. That song seemed such an obvious contrivance of corporate executives, and from a performer who was the epitome of the counter culture.
If the reviewers of this film are correct, there is a line that was crossed. They’re not saying it was anything illegal, and they’re not asking for legislation to stop it. But it’s ugly. And it should be called out by critics.
Hollywood uses Creative Accounting practices. There’s a bombshell. :rolleyes:
If that’s all you got from the thread, you did not read it very carefully.
When did we get so many Randians on the Dope? The fact that people are willing to pay money for something has nothing to do with whether it is nefarious or not. People willingly pay for a lot of scams, and even sometimes wind up feeling happy they did so. It’s still a scam.
I slogged about 22 minutes of that review before I had to quit. Adam Sandler may be a tool and his movies pure trash, but two are just unbearably pretentious snots.
That’s exactly what Ayn Rand would think too. The whole book with the architect dude is basically about that.