The Longest Yard Movie Review: By Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com

The Longest Yard certainly seemed like a promising idea, and though it does manage to generate some laughs along the way, it’s ultimately another in the ever-growing ranks of remakes that shouldn’t have been remade.

In this updated take on the classic Burt Reynolds gridiron prison drama, Adam Sandler plays Paul "Wrecking" Crewe, a disgraced ex-NFL player who takes an ill-fated joyride in his girlfriends car. A busty Courtney Cox plays the domineering “high-maintenance” girlfriend, who turns her back on Sandler after he wrecks her car and finds himself in the slammer.

As fate would have it, the warden (played by veteran James Cromwell), is a big-time football fan and right away prevails upon Sandler to coach and captain a team made up of inmates in a friendly game against his crack squad of prison guards. Obviously, Sandler isn’t in much of a position to decline the offer, and agrees to take this rag tag band of underachievers under his wing.

It’s been several years since I’ve seen the original Longest Yard, but I do recall that, while it had plenty of comical moments, it was played more as a dramatic underdog sports movie. This Longest Yard, by contrast, appears to be a vehicle for the big name stars involved (i.e. Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, rap star Nelly etc.). Not that there’s anything necessarily wrong with that. I’m actually a pretty big fan of Sandler (save for Little Nicky and The Waterboy), and enjoy some of the chances he’s taken (see Punch Drunk Love or Spanglish). While The Longest Yard could be construed as a typical Sandler vehicle to a certain extent, this is a more tame Sandler on par with the lighthearted guy we saw in 50 First Dates.

As for Chris Rock, this is one of his better film efforts, but given his track record (Head of State, Down to Earth, Lethal Weapon 4) that’s not saying much. In all honesty, I found his vocal work in the recent Madagascar (which, surprisingly enough, opened on the same day as The Longest Yard) more amusing, and Nurse Betty and New Jack City remain the two high points of his acting career. What I like about him here, is his likable spirit. Most of the jokes he’s forced to utter are pretty stale, but I really enjoy the way he carries himself in The Longest Yard.

Burt Reynolds is also back, but with far less swagger than he brought with such ease to the original, still it’s a brand of movie star presence that Sandler can’t touch. In this Longest Yard, he’s more of the venerable vet, but it suits the project just fine. It’s also fun seeing James Cromwell as the heavy - not that he’s any stranger to playing nasty characters (check out his brilliant work in L.A. Confidential). And I really enjoyed the underrated William Fichtner as a mean prison guard who ends up not being such a bad-ass after all.

Though it’s a guilty pleasure of sorts, the actor I was most excited to see in The Longest Yard is David Patrick Kelly who you may remember as that slimy rat Sully in 1985’s gratuitously violent Schwarzenegger masterpiece Commando. I must confess however, that this is purely for nostalgic reasons. I wish there would have been more of him in this movie, because he plays gutter slime with the best of ‘em.

I enjoyed parts of The Longest Yard. As juvenile as it is, I loved the bit involving Tracy Morgan as an inmate in touch with his feminine side, but ultimately, this movie isn’t nearly funny enough. And this is odd, because it’s obvious that director Peter Segal (who’s collaborated with Sandler a few times before) is clearly going for laughs. So imagine my surprise when Segal and his screenwriters throw in a completely out of place sequence with Chris Rock’s character that stops the film dead on the ten yard line. True a similar fate befell one of Reynolds cronies in the original, but in that version it worked because that film was much more dramatic in tone. Here, it’s a complete mood killer.

The Longest Yard could have taken a big cue from the hilarious Stir Crazy. The classic Wilder/Pryor vehicle wouldn’t have been caught dead going in the direction this film does. In the end, The Longest Yard is yet another film that should have been left well enough alone. Still with names like Sandler, Rock, and Nelly interested, it’s no surprise that it was greenlighted even before there was a script.

Grade: C+

Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com