Occasionally funny; a little touching

Genre: Comedy
Video: 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen and 1.33:1 fullscreen
Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1, French Dolby Surround
Languages: English, French
Subtitles: English, French
Length: 76 min
Rating: PG-13
Release Date: 11/04/2003
Studio: Columbia Pictures

Commentary: Cast and Technical Commentaries
Documentaries:
Featurettes: "A Day With the Meatball" short film; HBO First Look Special; Whitey and Eleanore's House, Davey's Trailer, The Mall, Banquet Hall, Community Center
Biographies: None
Interviews: None
Trailers/TV Spots: "NBA: Love It Live" TV spot, Adam Sandler's Eight Crazy Nights, Anger Management, Big Daddy, Medallion, Mr. Deeds, and Original Programming TV
Alternate/Deleted Scenes: Multi-Angle Animation Progression; Deleted Scenes with Optional Commentary
Music Video: "Chanukah Song Part 3"
Other: widescreen and fullscreen options

Cast: Adam Sandler
Written by: Brooks Arthur, Allen Covert, Brad Isaacs, Adam Sandler
Produced by: Adam Sandler, Jack Giarraputo, Allen Covert
Directed by: Seth Kearsley
Music: Ray Ellis, Marc Ellis, Teddy Castellucci

Review:
The beginning of the story, which is related near the end of the movie, is that of a bright and energetic young man who loses his parents in a tragic accident then undergoes a drastic personality change, turning from the town hero into the town zero. This now grown man, Davey Stone (voice - Adam Sandler), is constantly getting into trouble and doesn't really seem to care.

As the town's Christmas celebrations get underway, Davey creates a ruckus running from the police and lands himself in court, where he is about to receive a strict punishment, only for the local town do-gooder, Whitey (voice - Adam Sandler), to step in and volunteer to reform Davey by making him help referee the youth basketball games (where he used to be the star). The judge agrees and Davey is now forced to spend his time refereeing. Whitey also does his best to befriend Davey, but only really gets the chance when Davey makes a fool out of some guys at the local gym who retaliate by burning down his trailer.

Davey is then invited to and decides to move in with Whitey and his spinster sister, Eleanore (voice - Adam Sandler). Slowly, Eleanore and Whitey work their way into Davey's life, only to burn their inroads when Whitey innocently relates the story of what happened to Davey's parents. As Davey's inability to deal with this part of his past is the cause of his misbehavior, Whitey's recounting of the story turns him back into the anti-social jerk and leads him to rudely criticize Whitey.

Doing his best to brush off the criticism, Whitey then heads for home to get ready for the town's annual Christmas banquet. Whitey, as the town do-gooder, has been trying for years to win the town's prestigious ribbon given for outstanding service to the basketball league. Whitey and Eleanore dress in their finest, fully believing that this year will be Whitey's triumph. When he doesn't win, Davey's haunting criticisms come back and Whitey finally realizes that the townspeople really don't seem to care about him and all of the things he does for them. Crushed, he leaves with Eleanor to find solace in the mall. But Davey, having experienced a change of heart (also in the mall; Adam Sandler must have some strange mall fixation), bursts into the town celebration and gives them a powerful lecture on how they have overlooked Whitey, who has only been nice to everyone his entire life. The townspeople finally come to their senses and realize their mistake. They race to the mall and bestow upon Whitey the ribbons he truly deserves (he gets them from all the years he should have won them, which are all of them), resulting in a rather touching climax where Whitey's years of service are finally recognized.

I almost hate to admit it, but I was actually touched by this movie. It did such a good job of making Whitey a lovable but pathetic character who only experiences frustrating defeats that you can only feel sorry for him. In my more humanitarian moments (like right now as I write this), I am inclined to see Whitey as a representation of the average man (though heavily laden with pitiable characteristics) and this movie as being about how those people who do so much for society are often overlooked. This is especially true considering the person who wins the ribbon during the celebration is a billionaire who shelled out a pittance (for him) to buy a new scoreboard, as compared to Whitey's immeasurable time contributions (basically a variation of the Widow's mite story from the New Testament).

But the movie isn't without its problems. The biggest one is really something my wife pointed out early on: Who is the movie targeting? I mean, it seems most movies have an intended audience and/or a specific genre (action, drama, young girls, etc.), but this one doesn't really seem to have either. Because it's a cartoon you might think young kids. But this is really a cross between the Simpsons and South Park in crudeness, which means you can rule out children under 10. Teenagers may find it too cheesy to bear, and adults likely won't find it initially engaging, meaning you've lost all of your potential audiences. However, if you can make it through the first 30 minutes or so until you really get to know Whitey and fall in love with his character, the movie may suck you in, but you really do have to give it a lot of leeway.

As far as the story goes, it's not perfect and I don't think it has any pretenses to be perfect. Where is Davey's extended family? What happens between him and his former girlfriend? Why is Davey such a jerk? Even without answering these questions, the story works, but it does take a while to get your attention.

Overall, I didn't have very high expectations going into this movie and I really wasn't sure what to expect as it seemed to be some sort of hybrid Hanukah/Christmas movie. I didn't end up loving the movie, but it was better than I thought it was going to be and I was actually touched by the story, though I was touched more by Whitey than by Davey. It definitely isn't a movie for young kids, but some adolescents may enjoy and young adults may as well. It's probably a bit too crass for older adults to appreciate it, but you might be surprised.

Image and Sound:
I have no complaints on this aspect of the DVD; the image and sound quality are excellent. Also nice is the option to watch the movie in either fullscreen or widescreen, both of which are superbly compressed and mastered.

The Extras:
I've always been a fan of Adam Sandler's music (not that I think it is particularly pleasant to listen to, just that it's creative), so I enjoyed the music video, which is the third installment in his Chanukah songs series.

The "Day With Meatball" featurette is pretty lame. It's really just someone, probably Adam Sandler, filming his dog, Meatball, through the course of the day and pretending that the dog is much smarter than it really is. They put it into some humorous situations (the library scene was funny), but it gets old quickly. Thankfully it is a short short.

The second DVD has a ton of small featurettes looking at pretty much every element of the movie via the town of Dukesberry. When you click on the different locations it takes you to another menu with the option of seeing some of the deleted scenes and different stages of the animation process, along with commentaries and featurettes on most of the characters. It's incredibly informative and hours and hours of additional entertainment if you really want to get into the making of the movie.

Commentary:
The cast commentary was okay, but not particularly great, mostly because it is Adam Sandler trying to remain in character (he's acting as though he is Whitey and Eleanore and they actually exist). It makes for some laughs, but doesn't do much for additional information about the movie.

The technical commentary does a better job of this, but is a little on the dry side, though informative.

Final Words:
This is a pretty good movie with two big flaws - it doesn't have a distinct target audience and it takes a little while to really get into the story. But if you can persevere until it starts to get entertaining and the story develops, it eventually sucks you in and can even get a bit touching. The special features, including an entire additional DVD that covers almost the entire production process, are remarkable and make this 2-disc collection well worth your money if you ultimately decide you like the movie enough to buy it.