The Longest Yard

A truly miserable and nearly laugh-free remake of the 1974 Burt Reynolds vehicle, now starring, inexplicably, Adam Sandler. Sandler plays former pro quarterback Paul Crewe, which is a little hard to swallow, what with Sandler’s weak and wobbly chin and generally noncompetitive demeanor. Crewe is sent to prison, where he has to mount a team of inmates to play against the guards. All the standard stereotypes are in play, in the most shallow and one-dimensional way possible. As such, there’s not much of a reason to care about the outcome of the game, since nobody seems real enough to root for. There are a few decent moments thanks to Chris Rock, but other than him, almost nothing in this film works. On a scale of one to seven, with six being the highest, I’d give this a two, and then only out of nostalgia for the original, which, whatever its flaws, had the markings of its age of maverick filmmaking, when the idea of resistance to authority was only just beginning to be co-opted by that very authority as a path to increasing sales of hamburgers and soft drinks. Sad.