Click
Directed by Frank Coraci
Comedian Adam Sandler enshrines his own adolescence, but at least he also satirizes it in Click. In this comic fantasy, Sandler plays Michael Newman, an overworked architect who longs to be the ultimate coach potato. He decides a universal clicker will make his life easier, providing simpler access to the TV, garage and other household toys. But the implement Michael brings home from Bed, Bath and Beyond the Beyond gives him the miraculous ability to speed past unpleasant marital arguments, mute his boring boss or rewind to relive favorite memories. And like a pubescent boy, Michael can't stop playing with his new appendage.
Although Click becomes a cautionary tale, showing Michael ruining his life through selfishness, it makes no profound statement on modern technology or alienating conveniences. Michael simply reassesses the lifestyle privileges ordinarily taken for granted. Click accurately gauges our spoiled-American ethos through its pop culture influences. Michael lives a TV-sodden life. Henry Winkler (The Fonz) and Julie Kavner (Marge Simpson) play his parents; his boss is a boob-watcher (Baywatch's David Hasselhoff); and Michael's wife and mother of his two children is still a sex bomb (Kate Beckinsale), the ultimate sitcom fantasy.
Despite innumerable TV references, Click is not merely a series of in-jokes like Ben Stiller's The Cable Guy. Sandler has more heart than Stiller, proven when Michael notices his wife's anger and asks incredulously, "You hate me?" That sudden despair recalls the insight of James L Brooks' unfairly maligned Spanglish. Brooks turns out to be an ideal influence. That's why Click's best scenes come within hailing distance of The Absent-Minded Professor, Back to the Future and Being John Malkovich. Sandler's comedy isn't becoming refined (he remains an unapologetic ethnic-Jewish , all-American vulgarian and poopologist), but his humor is undeniably deepening.