#43 Going Overboard (Wes)

Going Overboard

It had to happen on a list of bad movies. We had to watch an Adam Sandler film at some point. Honestly I was quite surprised that it was this far into our list though. I mean I know he’s made some bad movies recently, but are any of them actually any worse than some of the other crappy comedies we’ve watched, like Norbit (see here) or Chairman of the Board (see here)? Well there was only one way to find out…

Shecky Moskowitz (Adam Sandler) is supposedly a wannabe stand up comedian who works on a cruise ship. After the regular ship’s “comedian” Dickie Diamond (Scott LaRose) gets locked in the toilet, everyone naturally assumes he has fallen overboard and drowned. So instead of mounting any type of search and rescue operation, they just allow Shecky to tell jokes that were old when Bob Hope started his career, in the desperate attempt to distract the people on the cruise ship, and the viewer at home, from the poor life choices that led them to be in/watching this crappy movie (eg like getting drunk and saying that watching the worst movies ever made sounds like a hilarious idea)…

As much fun as it is to knock Adam Sandler, he has made some movies that I love. Happy Gilmore, The Wedding Singer, Punch Drunk Love and Hotel Transylvania are all brilliant. I’m even happy to sit and watch Little Nicky and The Waterboy, but he has made some absolute donkeys to counteract these movies though. What I didn’t realise is that he had set the bar so low at the start of his career, that no matter how bad a movie he makes now, it’ll invariably be better than Going Overboard.

Have you see or read any of the Harry Potter series? If you have then you should know what a Dementor is, if not they are magical beings that guard the wizard prison Azkaban. They do this by sucking all the happiness from the prisoners so they simply lose the will to try to escape; Going Overboard is a Dementor in movie form. This movie sucks all the joy from the world. It’s the movie equivalent of going to bed on a Sunday night knowing that when you wake up you have to go to work. It’s the movie equivalent of being given a piece of fruit for dessert. It’s the movie equivalent of being told there is no Santa Claus.

If you’re a Superman fan (hopefully not a Superman 4 fan though.. See here), then you’ll know who Bizarro is. If not he’s the Superman from another planet (htraE) in the DC Universe where everything is opposite to that on Earth. Well Going Overboard is like a Bizarro comedy movie. It’s actually an anti-comedy movie. It’s less funny than watching Bambi’s mother not escaping the hunters on repeat. It makes Mike Leigh’s most pessimistic movie, Naked, seem like a laugh riot. I listened to my Joy Division albums after watching this as I needed cheering up. It’s seriously that unfunny.

I honestly don’t understand how Sandler managed to stay acting after this movie. It is genuinely the worst comedy movie I’ve ever seen. The only way it could have been less funny would have been if someone dug up the remains of the Marx Brothers, fitted animatronics to their skeletons and made them remake a classic British sitcom for an American audience (OK, some have been good, but let’s not forget the pilots for Spaced or Red Dwarf, and trust me I’ve tried to, they just won’t go away).

Have I made it clear how unfunny this movie is yet? If you went to a stand-up show which was had your parents as the opening act who spent the entire time telling embarrassing stories about your childhood, whilst occasionally waving at you, who were then followed by a procession of various people from your past doing the same until you can stand the public humiliation no more, only to find out the night could actually get worse when Michael McIntyre walks onto the stage and announces he’s going to do a four hour set of his shit observations and they’ve locked the all the doors, including the ones for the toilet and you’ve just drank five pints of water, you’d still laugh more than you would at this movie.

This movie is the comedy equivalent of being told you have a sexually transmitted disease. This movie is the comedy equivalent of having to tell your children that Rover didn’t make it after being hit by a car. This movie is the comedy equivalent of doing your fly zipper up without being properly tucked away. This movie is the comedy equivalent to used needles in a children’s playground. This movie is the comedy equivalent of socks at Christmas. This movie is the comedy equivalent to finding out your babysitter is Jimmy Saville. This movie is the comedy equivalent to meeting the girl/guy of your dreams only to discover that their favourite Star Wars character is Jar Jar Binks and that they do the most accurate impressions of him, especially every time you have sex ("Me-Sah coming now!"). This movie is the comedy equivalent to learning that your child wants to become a mime artist. To put it in its most simple terms, this movie is the Nickleback of comedy!

This movie is without a doubt the worst comedy I’ve ever had to sit through. Which does make me worry slightly as it’s far from the last comedy on our list. It’s a shame that Adam Sandler couldn’t have used some of his subsequent wealth to sink this miserable movie to the ocean depths where it belongs. Avoid at all costs.