Reign over me

Very early on in this movie you realize 2 very inherent problems with it. First of all, the trailer is incredibly misleading. This movie is nowhere near as depressing and sad as you expect it to be. Secondly, Adam Sandler is in it. That is not to say that he is bad in it, but he is in it and that presents a problem because of the character he is playing. Sandler plays a man who lost his family on one of the 9/11 planes and from that day he hasn't been able to get his life back on track. He rides around the city on a motorized scooter, he plays video games all day and doesn't seem t0 grasp the world going on around him. essentially he is playing a child, not unlike just about every other Sandler flick. The biggest difference here is that we are supposed to feel terrible for him and not laugh at him. This presents a problem because Sandler has made an entire career of playing a big kid who yells a lot for laughs, so when you hear him yell it is just funny and here when he yells it is supposed to be incredibly not funny. Luckily for the movie there are things that made this a better film.


The biggest asset to this film is Don Cheadle. This man's talent is phenomenal and the way he can make a scene subtly funny and serious at the same time is mesmerizing. This is best showed during a fight he is having with his wife, played pointlessly by Jada Pinkett Smith. Cheadle stars as a man at a crossroads in life, bored at work, bored at home and friendless. He randomly comes across Sandler who was his college roommate. The two rekindle a very odd friendship and both instantly have a positive effect on the other's life. Cheadle laughs like he has never laughed before and Sandler has found someone who seemingly doesn't remind him of his family. Cheadle feels the need to help Sandler find his way and thus we have the middle to end of this film where sadly the focus is pulled from Cheadle and focused on Sandler and Liv Tyler playing his shrink as improbable as that sounds. Their sessions are painfully redundant and while the music used in the film acts as both a metaphor and literal thing, it gets a bit old to hear Springsteen blaring from the Ipod over and over.


Another asset is the script. The movie, written by it's director is funny, charming and touching and never feel forced. The directing is another story, but the script is wonderful. It gives Sandler a chance to flex some acting muscles, but also allows the Sandler character to not delve far away from what he know as his character to be. There are quite a few metaphors involved in the film- The video games, the kitchen and even the scooter- which makes for an interesting watch, but when it is all said and done, you aren't quite sure what happened. There are 2 or 3 side plots that seem forced, like the crazy patient who wants to go down on Cheadle, although they attempt to tie her to the major theme of the film, not all that effectively either, but Don Cheadle is just so amazing it is worth it just to watch him act. What he does with his face, with the props around him or even the way he puts his jacket on really tells something about his character and what he is going through. I almost wish his mid-life crisis were the focal point of the film. However, Sandler does a good job, he is just paying for his past sins in movies.