You Don't Mess with the Zohan [Rated/Unrated]

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There were moments in "You Don't Mess with the Zohan" that reminded me of "Happy Gilmore" because they were so outlandish and farcical--the kind of rapid-fire gags based on character that make you laugh though you know they're stupid and you probably shouldn't. And for the first two-thirds of the film there were enough of those moments to balance the really dumb ones, so I announced to my wife that I thought this Adam Sandler film was a 6 out of 10. "Shouldn't you wait for the big finish before you decide?" she suggested. Of course.

Make that a 5 out of 10.

Until an ending that felt like the drum of dumb--and me the sneakers in a dryer that just kept going and going--Zohan (Sandler) had me with his over-the-top portrayal of a retired Israeli counterterrorist agent who came to America to pursue his dream of becoming a hair stylist. Zohan is part Happy Gilmore and part Yakov Smirnoff ("What a country!"), a lively character who's a little naïve, a little sweet, a little dangerous, and more than a little oversexed. With his gold chain, disco attitude, and ideas of style dictated by an outdated magazine, Zohan is also as much of an anachronism as Austin Powers.

But it's hard to escape your past, even if you do a bang-up job of faking your death and find gainful employment in the tiniest little troubled beauty salon in a Manhattan neighborhood that's populated by a mixture of Palestinians and Jews. One of the Jews recognizes Zohan, and so, unfortunately, does his nemesis from the Old Country, a Palestinian terrorist-wannabe cabbie (Rob Schneider) named Salim.

Sandler co-wrote the script with SNL veteran Robert Smigel and Judd Apatow ("Knocked Up," "Superbad," "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story"), and it's clearly a joyous return to the silly comedies that made Sandler a star in the first place. Sandler really seems to be enjoying himself, as does Schneider. Manhattan turns out to be a small place, though, as the beautiful woman who hires him (Emmanuelle Chriqui) is a Palestinian, and running around the burrough looking like a WWF character is Zohan's nemesis, The Phantom (John Turturro), who operates a terror cell and trains by swallowing glasses of eggs (already hatched into chicks) and punching sides of beef, Rocky-style (including a still alive-and-kicking cow). Sandler and Co. should have stopped right there, because if anything kills the mood, it's the inclusion of a tired and shopworn ultra-nemisis: real estate developers who hire right wing nuts to pose as Israelis and Arabs and firebomb businesses to stir up tensions, so people will want to sell and move out.

Zohan on a neighborhood watch is entertaining, but as it was with Warren Beatty in "Shampoo," the pure delight comes from watching Sandler-as-Zohan interact with the female customers who line up in droves to have their hair cut by Scrappy Coco, as the Zohan is known. It begins innocently enough, with a little old-woman flattery about the desirability of her "teats and ass," and then progresses to a few pelvic grinds during the styling, and finally all-out sex. The unrated extended version offers four more minutes of the bare butt stuff than the theatrical film, but both prints get a little raunchy. The movie version is rated PG-13 for "crude and sexual content throughout, language and nudity." And it's not always pretty. Near-septuagenarian Lainie Kazan isn't bashful about showing her tush, for example.

Now, admittedly I'm allergic to cats and have felt the need to use my foot to guide them away from me when I visit a home that's infested with them, but the gag that cracked me up the most was a clever CGI sequence where Zohan and two pals play hacky-sack with a live, screaming cat. I can picture others cringing when they watch that gag. That's the effect that a number of the jokes have. Either you're going to laugh in spite of your better judgment, or you're going to cringe. But the cringe factor is only part of why this film ultimately falls short of being the second coming of "Happy Gilmore." It's that real-estate developer nonsense and an ending that spends all of the cleverness capital that the film built up in the first two-thirds. I can't say it's the directing, though you'd think a director might have been more insistent about changes in the script. But Dennis Dugan ("Big Daddy," "I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry") might have been a little reluctant to change too many of Sandler's lines, especially when he's a producer as well. Who can blame him? Sandler's a talent and a force, but like Robin Williams he can use someone to tell him when the deep end isn't worth diving into.

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