2003, PG-13, 100 minutes

The comic teaming of Adam Sandler and Jack Nicholson promises a fun time in front of the television set. Many critics loathe watching a Sandler movie, but I've found a few of them to be enjoyable; Happy Gilmore and The Wedding Singer are two movies that immediately come to mind. Neither film is too corny, and they provide frequent doses of laughter. Jack Nicholson is also no stranger to comedy; he won a Best Actor Oscar for his wonderful performance in 1997's As Good As It Gets. So, does the movie live up to the promise? Ehh, kinda.

This film could easily be a lot worse, but it could've been a whole lot funnier. The story follows Dave Buznik (Adam Sandler), a timid and calm man who's on a flight for work-related purposes. He calmly asks for a headset so he can watch the in-flight movie, but the flight attendants are idiots and he ends up being tasored by a cop on-board. Because of his "outburst of anger," he is ordered by a judge to go through anger management therapy, with the instructor being Jack Nicholson himself (although his character is called Buddy Rydell). However, this isn't just a group session with people talking about their problems in a circle - Rydell eventually moves in with Dave, and takes control of his life.

Obviously, with Nicholson and Sandler on board, we're gonna have a few laughs from their banter. There's also some cute moments, including cameo appearances by Bobby Knight (as himself) and Heather Graham (as a skinny girl who thinks she's fat). Sadly, real belly laughs are few and far between - so I don't think Anger Management succeeds as a dowright comedy. We've seen this stuff before, and Anger Management fails to make it funny again. The film had many amusing moments, but I watched the movie to laugh!

Adam Sandler is a lot calmer this time around, as he's actually a calm, misunderstood, takes-all-the-crap-thrown-at-him kind of guy. Usually we have Sandler knocking people over or beating up game show hosts, but we don't see a lot of that this time around. Jack Nicholson plays Jack Nicholson, and I relished whenever he came on screen. Nicholson has always had an undeniable screen presence, and this film is no exception. He is the reason to watch this movie; Sandler is more-or-less a bonus.

Anger Management doesn't succeed at providing a whole lot of laughs, but it's an enjoyable diversion. Thankfully, it doesn't get too corny at the end (certainly a lot better than Bruce Almighty, where you could almost taste it), but I didn't really appreciate the big twist. All flaws aside, Anger Management is worth watching, although I wouldn't spending too much hard-earned money to do so.