Just Go With It (Review)

JUST GO WITH IT
(2/11/11; Romantic Comedy)
Adam Sandler, Jennifer Aniston, Nicole Kidman, Brooklyn Decker, Nick Swardson
SCR: Timothy Dowling, Allan Loeb
DIR: Dennis Dugan
MPAA: PG-13 for frequent crude and sexual content, partial nudity, brief drug references and language.
1 hour 56 mins
BOX: $102,806,000

This reworking of Cactus Flower (1969) keeps the basic plot: a philandering plastic surgeon pretends to be unhappily married to get women. When he finally meets the woman of his dreams (Decker), he attempts to change his ways but she finds his wedding band. He tells her he’s getting a divorce but she demands to hear it from his wife directly. He asks his office manager Katherine (Aniston) to pose as his wife to prove his story.

But things spiral out of control when one lie leads to a bigger one, and so on. The original material – a French play, then an American play, then an Oscar-winning film – all lives within the realm of “sex farce” starring grown-ups. But in Dugan and Sandler’s hands (their sixth collaboration), we get pee-pee jokes, Dave Matthews picking up a coconut with his butt cheeks and a small boy taking a crap on an adult man, who then screams about it in a fake German accent.

Brooklyn Decker steals the show by being so damned beautiful and actually resembling a human being. Sandler and Aniston’s familiar shtick is so broad and forced that it plays like a Three’s Company episode. Why is Nicole Kidman slumming as Aniston’s old high school nemesis? Couldn’t they find another Oscar-winner for the pointless hula-dancing smackdown with Aniston (officiated by sportscaster Dan Patrick)?

(Columbia)

— DENNIS WILLIS

Author: Dennis Willis

Dennis Willis is an award-winning producer, TV host, producer, director, editor (he preferred Avid until a torrid affair with Adobe Premiere, and the rest is history), author and film critic (print and radio). Dennis produced and hosted the TV programs Reel Life, FilmTrip, Soundwaves (1983-2008) and produces the annual Soundwaves Xmas program. He is currently the film critic on KGO Radio in San Francisco, and a member of both the San Francisco Film Critics Circle and the Broadcast Film Critics Association.

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