I’m increasingly convinced that Adam Sandler movies are like family vacations with little kids. You forget how much they complained about walking, how tired they always were, the constant snack demands, the heat, the lines, and the way you had to stop every thirty feet for a photo. Over time, though, you just remember the good parts. And the photos reinforce how fun it all looks, even though, at the moment they were taken, your wife was hissing, “Please just smile and stop ‘mewing’ at the camera, whatever the hell that is!”
That’s what Adam Sandler movies are like. They’re also a lot like SNL episodes: you remember the good sketches, not the 80 percent that sucked. I’ve rarely given a Happy Madison production a decent review in the last 20 years, and yet I still feel a weird fondness for a few of them. There’s usually a standout gag or two buried in the rest.
I suspect one day I’ll look back on Happy Gilmore 2 with that same misplaced affection. I’ll remember that Shooter McGavin showed up (though I won’t recall how briefly), or that scene with Margaret Qualley, Eric André, and Martin Herlihy that was sort of funny. I’ll remember Steve Buscemi was in it, but ideally forget that Rob Schneider sprinted through with his tired “You can do it!” bit.
Most of all, I’ll remember that I like Adam Sandler, even though — aside from You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah — he hasn’t made a truly decent Happy Madison movie since 50 First Dates, a film I didn’t even care for at the time (though, like all of them, it’s grown on me).
The problem with Happy Gilmore 2 isn’t just the wall-to-wall fan service, the pointless cameos, or the fact that it fridges his wife (Julie Bowen), though all of that is obnoxious. It’s that Sandler takes everything too far. Every joke is dragged past funny and straight into dumb. The movie is overstuffed, cartoonish, and proudly idiotic. It’s a kids’ movie, which would be fine, if it weren’t a sequel to a 30-year-old film that most kids haven’t seen.
Here’s the plot, such as it is: Years ago, at the top of his golf game, Happy hits a ball into his wife’s mouth and accidentally kills her. He’s now a widower with four rowdy sons and a ballet-loving daughter, Vienna (played by real-life daughter Sunny Sandler). He’s broke, an alcoholic, working at a grocery store, lost his grandmother’s house, and needs $300,000 to send Vienna to ballet school in France.
Though he swore off golf after Virginia’s death, he tries to sober up, attending AA meetings with Charlotte (his other daughter, Sadie Sandler), hosted by his old nemesis Hal L. (Ben Stiller). He digs out his old golf clubs (and hockey sticks) and returns to the game. Eventually, he melts down again, landing in a tournament against players from an extreme new golf league run by a sports drink mogul named Frank Manatee (Benny Safdie). Everyone in the league has had bones surgically removed to hit balls harder, and the courses are souped-up mini-golf nightmares. Eventually, Happy teams up with Shooter McGavin to bring down the extreme league and save traditional golf.
It’s dumb. Every part of it is dumb. But I’m too old to rail about harmless, juvenile Adam Sandler comedies, especially when they’re stuffed with Happy Madison regulars (plus Travis Kelce). On the surface, it’s a terrible movie. But it’s got just enough nostalgic glow, familiar faces, and sporadic laughs to almost forget how bad the rest is. And in five or ten years, we’ll look back on it with totally unearned fondness, after the decent moments are clipped into YouTube videos and Instagram Reels.
For now, though, it’s just a dumb Netflix movie to tolerate.
