Sandler's best in a long time
You Don't Mess with the Zohan (2008)
Synopsis: Dennis Dugan (BIG DADDY, HAPPY GILMORE) directs this comedy co-written by Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow, and Robert Smigel. Disco- and hummus-loving Zohan (Sandler) is the Israeli army's best weapon. He can single-handedly take out terrorists and swim like a dolphin, and still find time to... Dennis Dugan (BIG DADDY, HAPPY GILMORE) directs this comedy co-written by Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow, and Robert Smigel. Disco- and hummus-loving Zohan (Sandler) is the Israeli army's best weapon. He can single-handedly take out terrorists and swim like a dolphin, and still find time to charm the ladies. But this lethal weapon is tired of fighting Palestinian terrorists like the Phantom (John Turturro). He has bigger dreams: he wants to cut and style hair. Unfortunately, once Zohan arrives in New York City with a new look straight out of the 1980s and an assumed identity after faking his own death, his lack of experience gets him laughed out of salon after salon. Finally, Dalia (Emmanuelle Chriqui), a Palestinian salon owner, gives him a shot, and the older patrons love him. But just as Zohan is hitting his stride, Salim, a Palestinian New York City cabbie (Rob Schneider) recognizes him, and suddenly the Zohan's dream is in jeopardy. To confuse matters more, there is a Trump-like developer (Michael Buffer) who is trying to clear out the Manhattan neighborhood where Israelis and Palestinians peacefully coexist in order to build a mall. A bulked-up Sandler is amusing as Zohan, and this is Schneider's best performance in years. Despite the extreme stereotyping, there is an underlying message about the futility of war and fact that people really are, after all, just people. The film is peppered with brief appearances from a menagerie of celebrities, including Chris Rock, Dave Matthews, Charlotte Rae, Kevin James, John McEnroe, Mariah Carey, George Takei, and Bruce Vilanch. Lainie Kazan and Nick Swardson also star in this film as a mother and son who befriend the new immigrant. [More]
Genre: Comedies
Starring: Adam Sandler, John Turturro, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Nick Swardson, Lainie Kazan
Screenwriter: Robert Smigel, Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow
Producer: Adam Sandler, Jack Giarraputo
Composer: Rupert Gregson-Williams
Reviews
There are a handful of legitimately funny jokes, even though -- though it frightens me to say so -- I don't get as excited as I got when I was fifteen.
The script has a couple of actually funny gags, but hack director Dennis Dugan messes up the delivery in service to Sandler's titanic ego.
If "Munich" is the disease, the Zohan is the cure. Some hard little grains of truth make this Sandler's funniest movie since "The Waterboy."
Things work out, of course, to everyone's satisfaction: there are a few political gags that have a veneer of audacity, but in essence, the movie takes risks only with its audience's gag reflex.
If only the Zohan hadn’t messed with us. Worse than his excruciating Chuck And Larry, Sandler seems determined to refine the unfunny comedy. Please, Mr Sandler, stop it. Please. It hurts.
Sandler's unflappable Jewish gigolo superhero hairdresser act is an overconceptualized drag.
Director Duggan serves up a scattershot satire that is about as funny as a Palestinian landmine at an Israeli kiddie birthday party. Broad, offensive and thinly veiled...
This moviegoer has no trouble with lowbrow comedy. The problem with Zohan, however, is that it’s like a kid who tells you a silly joke, gets a laugh, and immediately tells the same joke again.
I’m all for politically incorrect humor, but there has to be humor in the political incorrectness, and I didn’t get it here.
It goes on too long, but I enjoyed much of the crazy, off-the-wall nature of this political satire and the Sandler-Apatow brand of humour.
When it's funny, it's very, very funny, but when it's bad, it's downright awful.
For all its flaws, Zohan remains a tolerable if inane piece of entertainment that scores points for trying...
despite all of the film's problems, there are still plenty of very funny moments and Zohan is one of Sandler's more enjoyable characters.
When I think of movies that have a locker-room mentality I think of movies like this one, another sleazy, dirty-minded offering from Adam Sandler.
There are really only four jokes in the movie, and each of them goes from being pleasantly goofy to positively leaden as the film's needlessly protracted running time unspools.
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