MOVIE REVIEW: BEDTIME STORIES

Five of Seven Cows

Adam Sandler may have finally grown up. Ironic, then, that his newfound maturity is demonstrated in a kiddie flick, the innocuous Bedtime Stories. This may be the first of his manically childish movies that any decent parent would actually want their child to see. Sandler, the eternal innocent with the potty mouth, finally delivers an innocent bit of entertainment that children will love and parents can tolerate.

           

In Bedtime Stories, Sandler plays the adult child of a failed motel owner who now works for the motel mogul who bought his deceased father’s business. When Sandler’s character, Skeeter Bronson, gets the opportunity to babysit his sister’s children for a week he tells them bedtime stories that miraculously come true – though not always in the way imagined.

            

 A maintenance man with delusions of grandeur, Skeeter believes he deserves a shot at upper management based on a promise made to his late father by the new owner. Armed with his magic bedtime stories he conspires to make it happen, of course winning the “fairest maiden of them all” in the process. The fairest maiden, played by Keri Russell, is appropriately lovely and wholesome, as all good maidens are. Russell Brand is enjoyable as Skeeter’s daft friend Mickey. Laura Ann Kessling and Jonathan Morgan Heit are fine as children Bobbi and Patrick, though given the fact that they each have three names they’re probably doomed to become presidential assassins.

            

 Richard Griffiths is great as Barry Nottingham, the narcissistic motel mogul, and Teresa Palmer is excellent as his Paris Hilton clone of a daughter, Violet. There are angry dwarfs (really) and a big-eyed guinea pig that consistently earned the most laughs from the kiddie contingent. The guinea pig actually seems like a bit of a crutch. I can too easily imagine somebody yelling, “Cue the rodent!” whenever there was too large a space between laughs, and sure enough we’d be treated to a big face-full of giant-eyed rat. This is a family film, after all, so who’s complaining?

Well, here’s to hoping this presages a new trend in Sandler’s career. This is no great piece of work, but at least it’s innocent and well intended. Kids don’t care that it’s dumb, which alone should give it a leg up over his previous work. I mean, all of his movies are dumb, but kids can actually watch this one. Seems to make sense to me. I give Bedtime Stories five cows.