Hello guys and welcome to a brand new movie review! For this one, I am going to be catching up on one of the many long belated sequels that have come out in recent memory, one that really hit it big on Netflix over this past summer. Adam Sandler comes back in one his most recognizable roles in this latest attempt to follow up a beloved comedy in Happy Gilmore 2. That is a film that is often pointed to as one of Sandler’s better comedies and is easily among the better regarded films in the Happy Madison film canon (which includes such groundbreaking classics like Grown Ups, Jack and Jill, and Little Nicky among many others). I checked it out for the first time last year and would have to agree with that reputation as I think it is a very funny comedy that embraces its silliness while having a nice underdog story at its center. That being said, it is also not a film that I feel really needed a follow up of any kind, especially with how hit ore miss comedy sequels tend to be, and the trailers just gave me a bunch of concerns of this being a nostalgia chasing trip with a bunch of cameos thrown in to get some attention. Now, having seen the movie, is it better than those expectations would imply? Lets jump right in and see how close to the whole this ball get!
After his first big tournament championship win in 1996, Happy Gilmore has gone on to have a very successful golfing career, winning five more championships, amassing a great amount of wealth, and being a well liked celebrity. He’s even had a great family life with him and his wife, Virginia Venit, having five children together. That all changes though, after a tragic incident leaves him in the dumps, becoming a massive alcoholic, losing all his money, and struggling to take care of his kids, with his four sons getting jobs to support him and his daughter, Vienna, who is also an aspiring dancer. Things change however, when he realizes that he could make enough money to help his daughter get into a prestigious dance school, by playing golf again and so he decides to go out back into the field. However, it is a new era for the sport with a new Tour Championship approaching and the company of Maxi Energy Drink, wanting to launch golf into a modern world, with the Maxi Gold League. It now becomes a matter of whether Happy can keep it together and help his family win a better future.
As indifferent as I was towards the idea of another Happy Gilmore movie, there have been quite a few times where these sorts of comedy sequels can actually end up surprising me. For instance, I quite enjoyed Bill & Ted: Face the Music a lot more than I expected as it was able to tell a fun and oftentimes thoughtful story with something to say, while having plenty of great jokes that are in line with the spirit of the prior two movies. Unfortunately, Happy Gilmore 2 ends up having more in common with something like Coming 2 America than anything else. It is a movie that serves to exist to remind us why we love the first one so much, with so many callbacks and clips thrown into the audience’s face, but failing to stand on its own and provide a story with much of any substance to justify going back to this well. That’s not to say the film doesn’t have its moments. There are some really funny moments that feel like director, Kyle Newacheck, successfully channeling the silly and wacky sense of humor that Dennis Dugan was able to capture in the first film. Lots of insanely over the top stuff happens that is presented in such an absurd fashion, that its hard not to be at least a little amused. Plus, I enjoyed a lot of the jokes on trying to “modernize” golf into this whole ridiculous stunt to get younger people interested as it plays as an amusing riff on the whole “veteran having to get back into a modern world of the sport he loves”, just with a more exaggerated feel. There’s also some clever riffing on the idea of doing a sequel to Happy Gilmore showing some level of self awareness and a couple of fun ways of parodying the idea of a legacy sequel, with some of the callbacks actually working because of how they poke fun at the idea.
However, as surface level amusing the movie is at times (and for the most part, its a harmless watch on the whole), that doesn’t save the film from the fact that the story is largely threadbare. I cannot say I was that invested in the actual storyline as the emotional connection with these characters isn’t quite there, with them just being very stock characters as far as presentation and there isn’t much of an attempt to develop them. Instead we just get a barrage of jokes, callbacks, and cameos that often feel shoehorned in without much of a purpose beyond to make one reminiscence on the far superior movie one could be watching. Not helping is when the film tries to take things seriously by tackling things that may be a bit beyond what a comedy like this can meaningfully accomplish. Happy’s whole arc of dealing with his alcoholism is both treated as a joke (one of the running jokes is him constantly having alcohol flasks disguised as objects, which is admittedly a funny visual gag at times), but also mined for emotional sincerity and I don’t think it is able to any sort of resonance by trying to have its cake and eat it too. It doesn’t help that the movie is very repetitive in this regard with the same couple of scenarios of Happy playing golf (I would argue a pretty big percentage of the movie is just montages of golf playing) and Happy dealing with his drinking issue being recycled often throughout the runtime of the movie, with the occasional bit involving Shooter here and there. There isn’t much investment to be had and certain jokes either overstay their welcome or just aren’t funny, making me stoned face. Did I hate watching it? I guess not, but that doesn’t mean I’d consider it “good”.
At the very least, Newacheck is able to bring a decent amount of energy to keep things from getting dull. He is able to present a lot of the golf scenes in a fun and ridiculous way that keeps the constant montages from getting too boring and there is creativity in the climax in regards to how the different holes are presented and framed, where golf is treated like an extreme obstacle course more than anything and I appreciate the attempts to actually give these scenes an actual amount of tension. I will admit though the film’s visual style wasn’t wasn’t really doing much for me. I don’t know how to describe it, but the movie looks like the colors were saturated all the way up to an eleven and it just did not looking appealing to me, with it just being way too much, to the point where it looked like a commercial more than anything (that may be too harsh, but it just looked off to me). At the very least, I liked the way certain jokes and comedic situations were presented as at their best, they reminded me of the things that made me enjoy the original so much and made the movie feel like it came from people who were genuinely fond of that movie. That is one thing I can give Sandler credit for, is that he does genuinely care about the people he works with on these movies, regardless of the qualities and likes to give them as much props as possible and there are some nice beats here where that is apparent.
As for Sandler’s performance, well he does manage to bring back quite a bit of what makes Happy into a fun protagonist at times… you when he’s not drowning in his sorrows. It’s not that Sandler is bad when he’s in that mode, it’s just that it isn’t really fun to see Happy down in the dumps like that and when you zap all of the rambunctious energy, we’re just left with someone who only seems to embody him by name only. The Sandman still gets his moments to provide some solid comedic chops as he has a natural charisma to him that makes him watchable in his projects. But, this just lacked specificity of that character and while I understand that he is older, it just felt like a lot of the personality was not there for much of the movie, despite Sandler’s best efforts. I was also disappointed with how Julie Bowen’s Virginia was written out as the relationship was nicely done in the first movie and I liked that character, to the point where the way she was taken out just felt like a slap in the face. I understand the need to create an emotional arc, but it be one thing if the movie made it compelling. Instead I found myself missing her charm. There’s an attempt to try something similar with Happy’s daughter, Sunny (played decently by Sunny Sandler), but that role ends up being very thankless with her just there to be concerned about her dad’s wellbeing. The sons end up faring worse as they all are there to shout and do rowdy things, essentially being less funny versions of their father. As you can tell by the “less funny” part in the last sentence, the schtick gets old quickly.
When it comes to some of the returning players, it was very nice to see Christopher McDonald back as Shooter McGavin, who is a highlight of that first film for me. He brings that same energy here and even though he’s older, his delivery is still on point and I liked the way his character was handled here as I thought it would go in one direction, but it went in another. Do I wish he was given a bit more to work with? For sure, but McDonald seemed game to come back for another round. Ben Stiller also comes back as Hal, who is now an abusive leader for the alcoholic support group Happy is at and he is having a blast playing a very slimy character. It is fun to see him play this kind of role after a while and it was satisfying to see Happy realize just how awful of a man this guy was to his mom all those years ago. I kind of liked how he actually played a fairly big role here as far as representing Happy’s doubts and pessimism, cause in the original he was mostly just there as a joke/to make Happy’s mom’s situation even worse (which worked well in that movie). As far as newer characters go there are really only two that make any real impact. Benny Safdie seems to be having fun as the villainous Maxi Energy Drink CEO, Frank Manatee, who is essentially an obnoxious tech bro billionaire. There’s not much more to him beyond that, but Safdie plays the role as required and is able add bring some enthusiasm to make him into an fairly amusing over the top villain. Meanwhile, Bad Bunny gets to show off some more decent acting skills as Happy’s new caddy, Oscar, actually showing that he can do comedy quite well with solid comedic timing as he surprisingly can do silly humor very effectively. Most of the other new players are some variation of “child of character from first movie” which can at times be surface level funny, but at the same time there’s nothing for them to do, besides show up and remind us of those characters that had were handled freshly the first time. Oh and there’s a crap ton of cameos from a variety of celebrities ranging from those in the sports world to other aspects of pop culture and most of the time, with the exception of some athletes (whose acting skills… are not quite up to par), there mostly just there for us to point and recognize (though Travis Kelce does have one amusing moment involving a dream sequence).
Overall, Happy Gilmore 2 failed to make itself look better compared to other long belated comedy follow ups of its kind. It’s not a painful watch as there are plenty of moments that had me laughing, the energy is there, there’s a clear love for the original that can be sweet, I liked some of the self aware bits, and the cast is trying, with some standing out. However, the story is not that engaging, it struggles to balance its more serious subject matter with the wacky stuff, I wasn’t huge on the way it is shot, and most of the character arcs had me wanting more. If your someone who is a fan of Happy Gilmore, then you either will get a kick out of all the callbacks and similar vibe, or you’ll be left wanting a much better final product. I am firmly in the latter as it really did nothing to exceed my low expectations. I certainly didn’t hate watching it, though I do wonder if my fondness for that first film is preventing me from really tearing it a part. Either way, I think there is still in the moment entertainment value, though afterwards, I just came to realize just how many issues I had with it. I only hope that Sandler and co. had a good time making it and that he can move on to hopefully starring in more interesting and riskier projects.
Rating: C
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