A Life Through Film #032: Bulletproof
Adam Sandler tries to mix it up early in his film career and totally misfires
Release Date: 9/6/1996
Weeks at Number One: 1
Thanks for reading! This is my ongoing series where I track the evolution of American culture in my life by reviewing every number one film at the weekend box office since I was born in chronological order. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend reading my introduction post here, and be sure to like and share the review if you enjoyed it!
Over the course of the many years that this column will run (knock on wood), certain figures will emerge as repeat characters.
Some will be directors, visionary creatives whose films always draw people to the box office to witness the next evolution in their craft. Others will be actors, true cinema draws who put butts in seats thanks to some combination of looks, talent, and charisma.
We’ve already met a few figures who I’d put in this category, namely Tom Cruise, Jim Carrey, and, at least for a while longer, John Travolta. The faces and names will change a bit as years turn into decades, but some names will almost always draw a crowd regardless of how long they’ve been around. I see a lot of these stars and their popularity makes sense to me.
Then there’s Adam Sandler.
Did you know that the comedian is one of the highest grossing actors of all time? Does that sound right to you? Sure, Sandler has been a figure of mass popularity since the mid ‘90s, but so has Leonardo DiCaprio, and the comedian has him outgrossed at the box office pretty handily. But to look through the man’s filmography over the years shows a smattering of mostly poorly remembered comedies that weren’t even well liked at the time. How has Sandler become the kind of megastar whose movies have pulled in almost $3 billion collectively?
The big thing, I think, is output frequency. Once Adam Sandler became a household name, he hit the ground running and never looked back. I can count on one hand the number of years I’ve been alive that there hasn’t been a new movie starring the comedian either in theaters or, in more recent times, on the front page of Netflix. That kind of repeated mass exposure is only possible with a formula, and you can point to any number of big Sandler hits that follow the same pattern.
Sing along, you know the words: Sandler and a cohort of comic regulars (David Spade, Kevin James, Rob Schneider) find themselves in a wacky situation, usually in a beautiful location and across from a gorgeous actress decades younger than our star. Adam Sandler reacts to most things with glib disinterest but will occasionally start yelling at relatively minor inconveniences. There might be a lesson about the value of family in there, but you have to really search for it amid all the potty humor and questionable representation of women and non-white people.
I won’t yuck anyone’s yum, but I don’t necessarily want to hang out with the people who watch every single Adam Sandler comedy and are laughing vigorously from beginning to end. But do those people even exist? Or are the man’s movies just funny enough to most people to draw them into the theater for the one that comes out the next summer? Ooh, this one takes place in Hawaii and has Drew Barrymore in it!
That said, it’s not like Sandler doesn’t entirely avoid risks. Some of his most acclaimed movies, like Punch Drunk Love and especially Uncut Gems, find the comedian getting serious for a second, and I’ll admit, I liked the basketball dramedy Hustle when I watched it on Netflix a couple of years ago [3.5/5]. And even his comedies have shifted into only being mostly predictable. The bulk of his 2000s output follows the formula, but he mixes it enough now to make me think something like Grown Ups is all in service of getting movies like The Meyerowitz Stories or his daughter’s You Are So Not Invited To My Bat Mitzvah1 made.
Sandler builds some risky choices into his career because sometimes, those risks pay off. For example, his first time topping the weekend box office was also his only time starring in an action movie.
Bulletproof is a 1996 action comedy starring Damon Wayans, Adam Sandler, and James Caan that was directed by Ernest Dickerson. The plot follows criminal friends Archie Moses (Sandler) and Rock Keats (Wayans) whose bond is broken when Keats reveals himself as an undercover cop and Moses nonlethally shoots him in the head in response. Despite their broken friendship, the two must work together to survive so that Moses can testify against the dangerous crime boss (Caan) who’s trying to have him killed. And all the while, the two leads crack just so many jokes about how they’re totally not gay for each other. It’s as riveting as it sounds.
Usually I like to do a deep dive into the production of movies I write about, and I’ve found there’s almost always at least a few articles to find. Hell, in some lucky cases, I’ve found entire feature length documentaries to watch that outline the making of box office toppers.
No one thought to roll camcorder footage on the set of Bulletproof though, and no one flagged down an LA Times reporter to tell them that things were going great on set. There are barely any details for how this movie came to be; I imagine for most people in September of 1996, they just went to the movie theater one weekend and found a new Adam Sandler flick waiting for them. Let’s examine what we know for sure.
Director Ernest Dickerson was a Spike Lee collaborator for years. The two met in college at NYU Film School, and Dickerson acted as cinematographer for Lee for some of the director’s most acclaimed work, like Malcolm X and Do The Right Thing [4/5]. In 1992, Dickerson began to branch out as a director in his own right, starting with that year’s Juice starring Tupac Shakur. The film fit in snugly with the movement of young urban dramas that I’ve written about a bit before, and is still decently regarded today. This was a talented guy ready to keep his career rolling along on an upward swing.
At around the same time, Damon Wayans was ready to be a movie star. In ‘92, the comedian stepped away from In Living Colour, the sketch comedy show that he had started at the beginning of the decade with his brother Keenan. The show was notable for featuring a primarily Black cast, a far cry from the usually lilywhite talent on shows like SNL; ironic, then, that the show’s most famous alum is Jim Carrey.
But before his pasty co-star ever dreamed of becoming the biggest name in comedy films, Damon Wayans had already had a taste of it when he starred in action comedy The Last Boy Scout alongside Bruce Willis. That’s a movie I’ve only ever heard of (for now), but a Shane Black screenplay as directed by Tony Scott? I’m definitely interested in that combo.
As it turned out, so was the rest of America. The Last Boy Scout was a nine figure success in 1991, and even though Wayans played second fiddle to Willis in it, those kinds of numbers had to be enough to get him interested in more movie work. After leaving In Living Colour in 1992, he found some success with movies like Major Payne and Mo’ Money, both of which were solid comedy hits. In 1994, Wayans was invited to host Saturday Night Live, which is where he met and hit it off with a young comic named Adam Sandler.
I’ve written about this era of SNL before in my Black Sheep review, and Sandler was a big part of it. Originally brought on in 1990 as a writer, the native Brookylnite was able to work his way to the principal cast the following year. While I find his comedy style less distinct than someone like Chris Farley’s, you still know a funny Sandler voice when you hear it. His willingness to bask in the absurd as well as his famous musical bits helped him stand out from the crowd, even as the show suffered from low ratings during his era. Again, please refer to “The Herlihy Boy House-Sitting Service,” maybe one of the funniest skits I’ve ever seen from any show. No, I don’t know why.
When Damon Wayans met Sandler in ‘94, the singing comedian had only featured as a supporting player in a few feature comedies, but clearly had the itch for something bigger. Sandler not only told Wayans that the two should do a movie together, but that they should do a full on action movie as a pair. I guess he was a fan of The Last Boy Scout and wanted to see Wayans in that mode up close? Either way, Wayans agreed that it would certainly be cool to do a movie together at some point. That sounds like a guy just being polite, but maybe Wayans got more excited after Sandler was fired.
Remember those low ratings I mentioned for SNL? The NBC execs weren’t happy with the crop of young talent that producer Lorne Michaels had put together in the early ‘90s and wanted to more aggressively cycle in new cast members. In 1995, ahead of signing new talent like Will Ferrell and Tracy Morgan, Saturday Night Live fired both Sandler and Farley. Sandler says the NBC suits found him disruptive and annoying, so they just used the ratings as an excuse to get rid of him. That must have been tough as a young comic, but thankfully he had a back up plan ready to go.
The one-two punch of Billy Madison [2.5/5] in ‘95 and Happy Gilmore [4/5] in early ‘96 proved that Sandler could carry funny movies on his back to great success. Though neither topped the box office charts, they nevertheless lingered long enough in theaters to turn profits and become favorites from the time. As annoying as juvenile humor can be, if you endear yourself to teenage boys, you’ve got them as fans for life. Personally, I don’t love Billy Madison, but as I wrote in my Tin Cup review, I think Happy Gilmore not only still holds up, it’s the best golf movie of 1996. Sandler wouldn’t end the year without one more release though.
This is where I lose the timeline. The most firm source on this movie’s production is the Facts and Trivia section on IMDB, but I don’t like to use that in my research since all of those blurbs are unsubstantiated. This is a shame, because I’m confused by the existence of Bulletproof.
What inspired Adam Sandler to divert from his still emerging cinematic style to make a mostly straight action movie that’s only marginally more upbeat than what you’d typically find in the genre? When did Dickerson get involved as director and why? How much did the two stars contribute to the script, which is credited to Joe Gayton and Lewis Colick? Was this a serious attempt at branching out or just a young man’s lark?
If Sandler wanted to experiment with action, the buddy cop subgenre was a safe way to do it. After exploding in popularity in the ‘80s thanks to movies like 48 Hrs. and Lethal Weapon, the tested formula of pairing unlikely partners together to trade quips and shoot bad guys kept its luster into the ‘90s thanks to further sequels to those movies that popularized the genre the first place. These kinds of flicks rely on a relationship between its leads that's adversarial yet eventually begrudgingly respectful. Getting there requires a lot of sardonic, pointed dialogue, so comedians before and after Sandler have used buddy cop movies as an easy entry point into the larger space of action films.
Whatever happened that led to it though, the final result didn’t work. Bulletproof is a movie that people have forgotten about, and it’s unclear how much people cared about it at the time. Probably not a lot, because this movie didn’t make a lot of money. Maybe you could pin that on the masses being disappointed that their fresh new comic star wasn’t doing the Happy Gilmore routine this time around. But I think it’s easier to pin it on the fact that Bulletproof is a bad movie that dropped during a slow time of the year at the theater.
I don’t think an Adam Sandler action comedy is an inherently bad idea. Especially at this point in his career, the dude incorporated plenty of physicality via slapstick in both his previous starring roles. The biggest problem with Bulletproof is that it isn’t funny, and maybe worse than that, it’s not even trying to be gut busting. The tedious action and unwieldy plot take center stage, and the jokes we do get are usually eye rolling one liners that try to lighten the mood more than draw the focus on themselves. The whole endeavor feels strange and misguided.
Sandler is missing a lot of the brash charm that made him famous in Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison. Instead he mostly plays a perpetually pissed off petty criminal who can’t seem to understand the idea of empathizing with other people. This annoying character trait doesn’t lead to great comedic moments from an arc of him learning to actually be a decent person.
Instead the comedy comes from him crudely making jokes at everyone else’s expense for the entire runtime. This works in Happy Gilmore because the people he makes fun of are snooty old golfers, leading to a fun contrast between him and the targets of his derision. But in Bulletproof, Sandler is just an annoying asshole to everybody, including me, the viewer.
Wayans is playing the more straight-laced character of the duo, which is strange considering he also has legitimate comedy chops. I don’t think he gets more than a couple straight up jokes in this whole movie. Once he reveals himself as an undercover officer, he’s expected to be the buttoned up professional who refuses to entertain the idea of getting along with his co-star.
There’s a lot of missed opportunity in finding comedy in discovering the differences between his undercover persona and his real personality, or the metal plate in his head from when Sandler shot him. How was that not used in any of these fight scenes?
The core of any buddy cop movie is the dynamic between its leads, and the word I’d use to describe the relationship between Wayans and Sandler is “annoying.” Sandler’s mad that Wayans betrayed him, Wayans is mad that Sandler shot him in the head. They yell at each other about those two things for about 45 minutes until they decide that they’re cool again and team up against the big bad.
Their dialogue doesn’t charm, doesn’t force either character to examine themselves, and worst of all, it didn’t make me laugh, except once when Sandler used the term “overcircumsized.” I don’t like watching these two as enemies or friends. I’d rather just not watch them at all.
The legendary James Caan plays the villainous crime lord in Bulletproof, and you can tell that he is sleepwalking through his scenes for that check. A fun thing to notice while watching is that almost all of his appearances are in the same mansion, meaning he likely only had to show up on set for a few days to get his parts done. Good for him I guess.
The action itself is as bland as it gets. Lots of shooting guns from behind cover, loads of sparks flying off the environment, all the bad guys go down one after another. It’s jarring in a fun way to see Adam Sandler of all people squeezing the trigger over and over again in effort to end lives, but he and everyone else in this movie just sleepwalk their way through what should be the climactic moments. All the endless scenes of boring conversations and bad jokes led to this?
The most interesting fight scene in Bulletproof isn’t even all that great. It comes at about the halfway point, when Sandler and Wayans are staying in the honeymoon suite in a remote motel. I did briefly chuckle at the shootout being diegetically soundtracked by nearby pornography, but that’s basically it when it comes to using the environment to its fullest. Despite Sandler being determined to make an action movie when he first met Wayans, he didn’t seem to invest all that much in making sure that they made an exciting one.
If there’s one recurring motif that Bulletproof really likes coming back to, it’s homophobia. Specifically, the kind of gay panic “No dude I swear we’re a couple of straight guys” humor that leads to moments like Wayans tying Sandler up BDSM style and sticking a gun up his bare ass. By the time the movie’s villain threatens to sexually assault the two men, it’s clear that the movie is not interested in any other recurring bit besides pointing out that it’s gross when men have sex with one another. You may not be surprised to hear that the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation condemned Bulletproof on release due to its rampant homophobia.
If this were a technically competent movie, cool shots or effects might save it from the garbage bin. But despite one or two impressive practical effects shots (I’ll always marvel at a well done plane crash), the movie is weak on that front as well. Specifically, the audio component of Bulletproof is stunningly bad. There’s copious amounts of ADR, and the music is not only poorly composed, but mixed awfully into the scenes. None of the score matches the action on screen, leading to a sense of befuddlement at all times. What was the composer thinking?
By the time the movie gets to its climax, it feels like Bulletproof is just out of money. We only get to see our main three actors and Wayan’s love interest turned femme fatale traitor in a cheap looking rental mansion doing boring action and lots of talking. The sensation is like seeing the effect of a turning valve, the flow of money into the production slowed from a decent stream to a damning trickle. I’m hesitant to put the failure of the movie on budget concerns though. It’s not like they were doing great work before that valve turned anyway.
Is it admirable that Adam Sandler tried doing action so early into his career? Sure. Even if it didn’t exactly land, Bulletproof set the precedent for the comedian to take something of a risk every few movies. In the future, he’d use those opportunities to work with some all time dramatic greats like Paul Thomas Anderson and the Safdie brothers. Action didn’t exactly pan out for the Sandman, and normally I’d say it was worth the try. But having watched Bulletproof, I’m not sure how much Sandler even tried here.
The 8% this movie has on Rotten Tomatoes is brutal but fair. One of the fun parts of writing these columns is pulling quotes from reviews at the time, especially for bad movies. There’s an embarrassment of riches this time around, so I’ll include two. Barbara Shulgasser from the San Francisco Examiner really laid into the director, given his past work:
Ernest Dickerson began a distinguished career as cinematographer for John Sayles and Spike Lee. No matter how you feel about Lee's movies, at least they have interesting ideas at their cores. What a step up it must be for Dickerson to be out on his own now, directing junk.
Meanwhile, Leonard Klady from Variety took a stab at scornfully predicting the future of Bulletproof and still ended up being too optimistic:
Strictly programmer fare, pic is for die-hard, indiscriminate action fans and goes on the fast track to pay cable and video following a brief theatrical window.
Brief is right. Bulletproof made it exactly 8 weeks before exiting theaters. This $6 million opening was the second lowest grossing weekend for a chart topper in 1996, beaten only by next week’s movie. The only reason it topped the box office at all was because it was literally the only new movie to come out that weekend, and I guess people couldn’t be asked to go see such luminous films as Jack, The Crow: City of Angels, or The Island of Doctor Moreau. What a miserable September weekend at the box office. Screw this, I’m going to the mall.
The movie wasn’t without its fans entirely though. Entertainment Weekly caught up with some viewers right after a screening to get their thoughts:
Loren Smith, 15, student: “Why does Adam Sandler always play gay guys…even ones who act just a little gay? I don’t get that at all.”
Lennard Pascall, 48, soldier: “It’s excellent. I loved the trust — and the deception. The contrast between the two emotions is the best part.”
Carly Brady, 14, student: “I thought it was hilarious when Adam Sandler peed on himself. There was way more gunfighting than I thought there would be. I think that and some of the other stuff makes it more of a kid movie than an adult movie.”
Don’t go back and watch Bulletproof. When it’s not bad it’s boring, and if you’re looking for either action movies or Adam Sandler vehicles from around this time, there are so many better options. If you somehow pass it on streaming, keep it moving. You haven’t seen this one, but it’s not worth checking out. We have access to infinite content now. Did you miss Mad Men when it was airing and haven’t checked it out? Go do that instead.
Dickerson has had some decent work in the years sense, but the only comment of his about Bulletproof that lives on online isn’t exactly glowing praise:
There's a movie I did a couple years ago called Bulletproof. I'd like to just erase that whole experience.
Basically every other movie that Sandler starred in from 1995 onward lives on in the cultural memory of his career except for Bulletproof. Hell, he named his production company Happy Madison after his first two hits. But it may surprise you to learn that it will be a while before the comedian shows up in this column again. 1997 was a rare year off for him, and when he came back with The Wedding Singer [3.5/5] in 1998, it was blocked from the top spot by the monolithic Titanic. Worry not though, he’ll be back eventually.
Even if I end up watching a dozen mediocre Adam Sandler comedies that came out in the 2000s, I doubt any of them will match the boring and occasionally hateful badness of Bulletproof. Those lazy comedies may not be great, but at least they’re in the guy’s wheelhouse.
Rating: 1.5/5
Next Week: In the timeline of the column, Little Will is about to turn 1 year old! Let’s celebrate by concluding our arc on the leading career of The Muscles from Brussels. Happy birthday to me, it’s Jean-Claude Van Damme in his final ever box office topper as a star, Maximum Risk.
See you then!
-Will
I haven’t seen it, but my wife likes that one