{"id":4180,"date":"2024-09-24T02:46:12","date_gmt":"2024-09-24T02:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=4180"},"modified":"2024-10-13T19:49:11","modified_gmt":"2024-10-13T23:49:11","slug":"jack-and-jill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/09\/24\/jack-and-jill\/","title":{"rendered":"Jack and Jill"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Jack and Jill <\/strong>(2011)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Columbia\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 91 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (crude material including suggestive references, language, comic violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Dennis Dugan\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Steve Koren and Adam Sandler\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Rupert Gregson-Williams and Waddy Wachtel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Dean Cundey\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 11, 2011 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Adam Sandler, Katie Holmes, Al Pacino, Elodie Tougne, Rohan Chand, Eugenio Derbez, David Spade, Nick Swardson, Tim Meadows, Allen Covert, Norm MacDonald, Geoff Pierson, Valerie Mahaffey, Gary Valentine, Dana Carvey, Regis Philbin.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $74.1M (US)\/$149.6M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating:<\/strong> *<\/p>\n

\u00a0In a perfect world, a few lines of Al Pacino\u2019s dialogue in the perfectly painful comedy Jack and Jill<\/strong> would suffice as a review.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In regards to an extremely embarrassing commercial for Dunkin\u2019 Donuts in which he took part, Al turns to advertising executive Jack Sadelstein (Sandler, Grown Ups) and says, “Burn this. This must never be seen. By anyone. All copies, destroy them!” I\u2019m with him on this. Nobody should ever be forced to suffer the absolute indignity that is Jack and Jill<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In it, Sandler plays both title roles, twin siblings who couldn\u2019t be more different. Jack is a successful Los Angeles ad executive with a nice home and happy family. Jill is jobless and lives alone in the Bronx house she and Jack grew up in. That\u2019s right, you get twice as much Sandler here which isn\u2019t a bargain at any price. It just makes Jack and Jill <\/strong>twice as annoying.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Jack is dreading Jill\u2019s annual Thanksgiving visit. He can\u2019t stand having her around. She\u2019s loud, obnoxious, inconsiderate, crass and offensive. On top of that, he has to pick her up at the airport at 4am because she decides to take an earlier flight. It\u2019s only the beginning of the most uncomfortable family reunion since the Corleones got together in The Godfather Part II (1974), one of the many titles Pacino self-references in his DD commercial. But I’m getting way ahead of myself here. Let me talk more about the “plot” of this alleged \u201ccomedy\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u00a0After an incredibly uncomfortable Thanksgiving dinner during which Jill offends one of the guests, a homeless man (Covert, The Wedding Singer) brought by Jack\u2019s in-laws, to the point where he walks out on a free meal, she informs her brother she plans to stay through Hanukkah. Naturally, he\u2019s not pleased. It means eight crazy nights with his socially challenged sister. On the other hand, his wife Erin (Holmes, Go) and two young kids are psyched. They love Jill.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Oh, let\u2019s talk about Jack\u2019s two kids for a minute. They\u2019re both weird. His daughter Sofia (Tougne) wears outfits identical to the ones worn by the doll she carries with her everywhere. His adopted Indian son Gary (Chand, Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle), for whatever reason, loves to tape various objects to his body. There\u2019s no rhyme or reason to any of it, but I suppose that\u2019s par for the course in a movie as misconceived as Jack and Jill<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Jack is experiencing professional woes as well. He\u2019s trying to convince Pacino to appear in a DD commercial for a new product called \u201cThe Dunkaccino\u201d. Who better to promote it, right? The actor is more interested in hooking up with Jill with whom he becomes smitten. The only way he\u2019ll do the commercial is if Jack sets them up on a date. The problem is Jill isn\u2019t the slightest bit interested in Al. She hasn\u2019t even seen any of his movies. She has the hots for the family\u2019s Mexican gardener Felipe (Derbez, How to Be a Latin Lover). It all leads to the inevitable scene of Jack going on a date with Pacino disguised as Jill. It\u2019s not funny; it\u2019s creepy, even for this already creepy movie. Worse yet, director Dennis Dugan (Grown Ups) prolongs it to the point of excruciating agony.<\/p>\n

\u00a0As you can see, there’s not much of a story to Jack and Jill<\/strong>. It’s basically a collection of unfunny gags and humiliating situations. Not even Pacino and his \u201clittle friend\u201d could save this mess although it might liven things up a bit. Let\u2019s talk about the Oscar-winning actor for a moment. What\u2019s he doing here? Is he that hard up for money? Maybe he found the script amusing. If it was, it sure doesn\u2019t show in the finished product.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Now because Al Pacino plays Al Pacino, it means he’s going to scream every line of his dialogue at the top of his lungs. If he’s anything like the way he portrays himself here, I’m surprised the men in white coats haven’t thrown a big net over him yet. He starts out by having a complete meltdown during a production of Richard III. He breaks character and yells at an audience member whose cell phone is ringing. He proceeds to further embarrass himself by relentlessly pursuing Jill despite her clear feelings (or lack thereof) for him. In essence, he becomes a creepy stalker who doesn’t understand the word “no”.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Oddly enough, Pacino isn’t the creepiest thing in Jack and Jill<\/strong>, not by a long shot. That dishonor goes to Jill who does one embarrassing thing after another. She\u2019ll make you appreciate your idiot sibling even more. In addition to her numerous social faux pas<\/em>, she expects Jack to do the things they used to do as children like lay down next to her in bed and communicate via their special \u201ctwin language\u201d. He wants no part of any of it. Jill finds herself in one humiliating situation after another like a blind date at a restaurant that ends with her in tears when the guy (Macdonald, SNL) hides out in the men\u2019s room until she leaves. An appearance on The Price Is Right results in her being conked on the head while spinning the wheel. The list goes on.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Sandler should never dress in drag again……ever! He makes a very homely woman. Jill is like the annoying younger sister of Linda Richman, the very Jewish host of Coffee Talk, a recurring sketch on SNL. I kept waiting for her to get “verklempt”. This is the worst role of Sandler’s career and yes, I’ve seen Going Overboard. He\u2019s not much better as the put-upon brother. Jack is, for lack of a more succinct term, a total dick. He\u2019s rude, arrogant, self-centered and not at all likable. As such, we feel no sympathy for his plight. Holmes is okay as the supportive wife Jack doesn\u2019t deserve, but it would have been nice if her character got to do more in the movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Jack and Jill<\/strong> has an inordinately long list of celebrity cameos. Here\u2019s a partial list of the famous people who show up at various points: Johnny Depp, Dana Carvey, John McEnroe, Shaquille O’Neal, Christie Brinkley, Regis Philbin, Bruce Jenner and Jared the Subway spokesperson before he became persona non gratta. However, none of them sink as low as David Spade who follows Sandler\u2019s lead and appears in drag as a mean girl who mocks Jill one too many times. My question is this, was Rob Schneider too busy to put in his usual token appearance?<\/p>\n

\u00a0Jack and Jill <\/strong>opens and closes with interviews with real life twins, both fraternal (like Jack and Jill) and identical. It\u2019s the best part of the movie. It\u2019s the only good part. The rest of it runs the gamut from awful to cringe-worthy. It\u2019s badly written, directed and acted. Not a single millisecond of it is even remotely amusing. It\u2019s every bit as painful as dental work. The rap Pacino does for the DD commercial has to be seen to be believed. It\u2019s right up there with the infamous Rob Lowe\/Snow White number from the 1988 Oscars (handed out in \u201989).<\/p>\n

\u00a0On second thought, don\u2019t see it. It\u2019ll just give you nightmares. This statement applies to Jack and Jill<\/strong> as a whole. There have been a lot of bad \u201ccomedies\u201d starring SNL players; this is one of the absolute worst. One can only hope Jack and Jill<\/strong> falls down the hill right into the pit of oblivion and remains there. In Pacino\u2019s own words, no one should ever see this.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jack and Jill (2011)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Columbia\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 91 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (crude material including suggestive references, language, comic violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Dennis Dugan\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Steve Koren and Adam Sandler\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Rupert Gregson-Williams and Waddy Wachtel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Dean Cundey\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 11, 2011 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Adam Sandler, Katie Holmes, Al Pacino, Elodie Tougne, Rohan Chand, Eugenio Derbez, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5010,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies","category-this-sucks-so-bad"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Jack-and-Jill-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4180"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5011,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4180\/revisions\/5011"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}