Reviewed by: Becca & Joe

Directed by: Peter Segal

Produced by: Jack Giarraputo and Barry Bernardi

Cast: Adam Sandler, Jack Nicholson, Marisa Tomei, Luiz Guzman, Woody Harrelson, Allen Covert, Lynne Thigpen, Kurt Fuller, Jonathan Loughran, Krista Allen, January Jones, John Turturro, & Kevin Nealon

Dave Buznik (Adam Sandler) is usually a mild-mannered, non-confrontational guy. But after an altercation aboard an airplane, he is remanded to the care of an anger management therapist, Dr. Buddy Rydell (Jack Nicholson), who could probably use some anger management himself.

My intial out take on this movie was as follows "What the hell is Jack Nicholson doing?" So I went to see it, and though it wasn't an award winning movie, I have to say he was perfect for the part. He looks evil, he looks like the devil, and there isn't a person on this planet who could better fit the part. The ending of this movie, like most Sandler movies, ended rather corny. Although to see Nicholson and Sandler working together is something. I mean when do you think something like that will happen again? It's like Robert Redford and Bernie Mac working together.

Though I didn't laugh until I cried, I did catch the humor and I enjoyed this movie wasting about an hour and a half of my life. Take a wild guess who the man in drag is up in that picture there. Doesn't he make a pretty woman? I have to say that made me crack up to see him in that.

When seeing a film like Anger Management, you really don't expect Oscar worthy acting and you really shouldn't expect anything different with this. Adam Sandler is good actor but much of his funny moments come when he gets angry and somewhat psychotic. It is really hard for any actor to be tight cast but for Sandler, it really works well. Hopefully their will be more opportunities to show off his full range of acting like his role in Punch-Drunk Love. Jack Nicholson is great in this film. In a very rare moment, you get to see Nicholson act in a film just for the fun of it. Most expect him to be placed just in Oscar worthy films and playing sympathetic characters like he portrayed in About Schmidt but he offers something different that may break his mold of tight casting. The other characters in the film never really got to showcase much acting since the films was primarily focused on Sandler and Nicholson but they performed like most Sandler films.

Overall, Anger Management is a good comedy but not either Sandler's or Nicholson's best work. Certainly Sandler redeems after the embarrassment of Eight Crazy Nights but there are many out there who would agree that either the Waterboy or Big Daddy were much better then this. The main problem with Anger Management was that it was never really consistent. For the first twenty minutes, the feature starts off really slow but kicks into a big batch of laughs that gets the audience rolling on the floor. After that, it stalls and starts up again several times which makes it a problem for many audience members. Another problem was that many of the main jokes in the film were seen in the trailer and though there were many other jokes, they weren't as funny as the ones that were featured in the trailer. Is it really necessary to draw people to a Sandler film by giving away much of the main jokes in the film? Besides those problems, there were some good things to point out. The level of product placement in this film is a huge notch down from Sandler's previous films which is a bit of a relief. Sure it keeps costs down but it just comes off as cheap to some. The combination of Sandler and Nicholson really works but they aren't given too much to act off of. More then likely, most of the public will go see this film since it is that last big film until X2 opens in early May but for those of you still deciding, see it but take caution. The film is a good popcorn flick but nothing extraordinary. Anger Management is definitely, though, a great end to the pre-summer season for movies.