Anger Management (2003) Review

 After the gentler feel of Mr. Deeds, Little Nicky and Big Daddy, comedian Adam Sandler reclaims the zany drumbeat of his earlier work with gleeful support from Jack Nicholson and a stellar supporting cast.

It’s been a while since Adam Sandler has let loose in a vehicle of his own.

Jack Nicholson and Adam Sandler on set of Anger Management (2003) (Courtesy of Sony)

Lately, the Brooklyn-born Renaissance ham has reserved his love of slapstick, political incorrectness and topical gags for production efforts starring Saturday Night Live pals such as David Spade, Rob Schneider and Dana Carvey, as well as for a comedy album follow-up and foul-mouthed animated characters.

But as Bob Barker, Sandler’s celebrity pro-am golf partner in Happy Gilmore, would be the first to agree, the price is definitely right again at the Adam Sandler laugh out loud box office window. By this reviewer’s count, there are at least six good chuckles to the dollar.

Sandler stars as Dave Buznick, a downtrodden executive assistant whose only piece of good fortune is the fact that his gorgeous girlfriend Linda (Marisa Tomei) is still hanging around. When Buznick boards a plane to St. Louis for a business presentation and accepts an invitation to sit next to renowned anger management expert Dr. Buddy Rydell (Jack Nicholson), things quickly go from bad to worse.

His innocent request for airline headphones turns into an escalating encounter with a prissy stewardess (Nancy Walls of Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show) and before Buznick knows what hit him, he finds himself in the middle of a colorful cuckoo’s nest of anger management group therapy patients overseen by none other than the larger than life Dr. Rydell.

Beginning with John Turturro, whose mystery accent portrayal of butler Emilio Lopez was one of the few good things in Mr. Deeds, Sandler and Nicholson get to mix it up with a fabulous group of supporting players, some billed and many others dropped in as giddy flourishes of stunt casting. Let’s just say that Woody Harrelson hasn’t been this much fun since the Farrelly brothers threw him into Kingpin.

Nicholson’s scruffy and mischievous turn as the anti Dr. Phil is reminiscent of Walter Matthau’s twilight performances in films such as Hanging Up, Out To Sea and Grumpy Old Men. Like Matthau, Nicholson is able to light up one of filmdom’s most uniquely chiseled faces with the pranksterish energy of a teenage boy, leaving the audience with no choice but to smile at every turn.

Meanwhile, Oscar winner Marisa Tomei vaults to the top of Sandler’s leading ladies chart, taking her rightful place alongside Emily Watson, who co-starred with him in the dramatic detour Punch Drunk Love.

Frankly, it’s hard to imagine anyone who has more fun making Hollywood movies than Sandler. Next to the decades-old and well-oiled gang that comes together for Clint Eastwood’s Malpaso Productions, few can top the effortless and good time vibe that seems to permeate the comedian’s projects with his college buddies.

Nicholson, Sandler argue (Courtesy of Columbia Pictures)

In this case, though, a lot of the credit must also go to director and USC grad Peter Segal, who started out by breathing new life into the third installment of the Naked Gun series and most recently unleashed the loosey goosey NBC sitcom Hidden Hills.

His unbridled treatment of David Dorman’s script, whose million dollar 1998 spec effort The Guest if finally coming to the screen later this year as The Boss’s Daughter, manages to let Nicholson go wild without overwhelming the pacing of the movie or the rhythm of the other actors.

Now that Sandler has co-starred with Nicholson, there really is only one logical choice for the sequel that Revolution Studios will surely be considering; Joe Roth, (the studio’s head) how does Sex Addiction Management with Adam Sandler and Warren Beatty sound as a late summer 2004 release?