Dir. Dennis Dugan, US, 2007, 115 mins
Cast: Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Jessica Biel
Review by Carol Allen
Chuck (Sandler) is a womanising male chauvinist, Larry (James) a single father bringing up his kids after the death of his wife. They work together in the fire service and they are the best of friends. But then Larry discovers that if he were to die - a serious consideration when you're a fireman - his children can't inherit his pension and the only way round it is to get married. Still mourning his wife, he doesn't want to do that, but after he saves Chuck's life, he comes up with a bright idea: he and Chuck can pretend to be gay and register a domestic partnership then, if anything happens to him, Chuck can make sure the kids are alright. And as Chuck now owes him big time, he reluctantly agrees.
It's an odd idea for a comedy and there will be some people who will regard it as homophobic. But the real butt of the jokes is not homosexual men but homophobic attitudes, of which Chuck and Larry themselves are frequently guilty. Larry, for example, is worried that his young son, who loves musicals and wants to sing and dance, could be gay (a cute and assured performance there from young Cole Morgan), while Chuck gets most offended when people assume he's the "wife" of the partnership. One does at times wonder if the character's aggressive heterosexuality is perhaps hiding unacknowledged gayness, but that avenue is sadly never really explored. Sandler's "boy in a man's body" act can often be irritating but in this he's really funny. He has good lines and plays them skilfully and he and James work well together in their onscreen partnership. Jessica Biel is both pretty and likeable as the lawyer who takes up their case, when bureaucracy begins to suspect this gay marriage may not be all it seems to be. She thinks she's found a nice relaxing friendship with a gay man in Chuck. He however falls in love with her.
There are some fun cameos – Steve Buscemi as the suspicious official from the benefits office, whose car number plate reads "GOTCHA". Dan Aykroyd as the couple's commanding officer in the service; Rob Reiner as the eccentric Chinese minister who conducts their wedding ceremony and Richard Chamberlain as the judge who hears their case.
Despite the gay gags - one particularly outrageous one involves Chuck, Larry, their fellow fireman and a dropped bar of soap in the shower - the film, if anything, rams it's tolerance message home towards the end in a way that is both overemphatic and sentimental. However, for most of its length it avoids slush and buries that message in an entertaining comedy with a lot of heart and positive things to say about friendship and grief as well as tolerance. |
