Happy Gilmore 2

Grade: D

Happy Gilmore 2 is an excellent idea for a Super Bowl commercial stretched out to feature film length. At 114 minutes, it’s too long by 111. Sandler has nothing new or interesting to say with Happy Gilmore 2, and seems to have made it as lip service to the fans who just wanted to see him get the gang back together and do it again. And I think every significant cast member – who could come back – has returned, with tributes to the ones from the original who are no longer with us. There’s a surprising amount who didn’t make it to 2025. Is this Sandler’s equivalent of Shakespeare’s cursed Scottish play?

29 years after the events of the first film, Happy is under a self-imposed retirement after a flying golf ball, hit by him, took his wife’s life at a game. Now he is a widowed father to 5 teenagers/young adults, and constantly takes swigs of alcohol from whatever object he can hide it in. We see this gag over and over. He gets back into the game to raise money so his daughter Vienna can realize her dream of going to school for dancing in Paris. It could have ended after the match is played, but – as if everyone realized they needed to kill more time to bring it up to standard movie length – a whole other story is brought up and shoehorned in.

My taste in the Sandman has had an interesting, layered journey. I really didn’t like Billy Madison. I enjoyed Happy Gilmore (1996) enough. For all its ridiculousness, I thought he was finding his stride with something tolerable. The Wedding Singer was hackneyed and unrealistic. The Broadway musical made from it years later is much better. Big Daddy – despite an absolutely preposterous courtroom scene – was sweet, funny, uplifting lighting in a bottle. 8 Crazy Nights is stupid, but an extremely guilty pleasure. I could finally take him seriously as an actor in the likes of Punch Drunk Love, Uncut Gems, Hustle, and Spaceman. I dug him on SNL, and like his albums.

HG2 is populated with wall-to-wall cameos. Some of the real-life professional golfers have surprisingly adept acting and comedy chops, but otherwise, it’s Sandler’s friends dropping in for a lark. Haley Joel Osment, recently very funny as J.D. Vance in some skits on the Jimmy Kimmel show, has a couple of good bits here. Sadie Sandler, who starred in You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah, gives a performance more grounded and sincere than the movie deserves. I hope she occasionally breaks away from her nepo-baby bubble and tries her hand at some projects that don’t involve her dad, because she’s got the talent. I was disappointed by the treatment of Shooter McGavin as a character. After his defeat in ‘96, he’s spent the time committed in a mental institution. Christopher McDonald is reduced to acting nonsensical, with little to none of the smarmy Shooter suaveness.

It seems to have four or five endings. The real ending is one of the easiest ones I’ve ever seen. It comes down to “if I sink this final putt, can you give me every MacGuffin I’ve spent the entire movie trying to get?” It’s about on the same level as “magic solves everything” or “it was all a dream.” I was glad to have this one over with. In the 21st century, even in the last 10 years, Sandler has had some great performances in movies I’ve enjoyed, only further solidifying that he should continue looking ahead, rather than revisiting the past. I eat pieces of art like Happy Gilmore 2 for breakfast.

Grade: D