One-time funny man Adam Sandler has recently been making headlines for all the wrong reasons as he finds himself embroiled in a nasty racism row surrounding a comedy-western he’s currently shooting. But thanks to Pixels, making grossly offensive jokes about Native Americans won’t be the worst thing Sandler does this year.
Based on Patrick Jean’s charmingly retro 2010 short film of the same name, this completely uncharming and witless feature film adaptation sees professional slacker man-child Sandler as professional slacker man-child Sam Brenner, whose life peaked in 1982 when he competed in the World Video Game Championship alongside paranoid conspiracy nut Ludlow Lamonsoff (Josh Gad) and diminutive douchebag Eddie Plant (Peter Dinklage), narrowly losing first place to the latter in a game of Donkey Kong. The video of their epic arcade game face-off was then included by NASA as part of a sample of 1980’s human culture that was sent off on a probe into deep space on an attempt at making contact with extraterrestrial life.
Well, contact was made, but unfortunately these faceless ET’s misconstrue the video as a challenge of war and so send a retaliatory force, all modelled on the classic arcade video games they found. Soon giant digitized versions of Pac-Man, Galaga, Centipede and more are running amok on Earth, forcing the US President to call on his gaming wunderkind childhood buddy Brenner and his motley crew of societal rejects – helped out by Michelle Monaghan’s military weapons developer Lieutenant Colonel Violet van Patten – to save the day. The US President, by the way, is played by Kevin James, which is a sentence that no socially stable, mentally unimpaired adult can say with a straight face.
Continue reading the review at The Movies
(Spoilers: It doesn’t end well for the movie)
Last Updated: July 23, 2015
ZA Ludomusicologist
July 23, 2015 at 11:36
Most of these games are archaic – they belong to history and be kept there.
Lollies the Laughing Lollipop
July 23, 2015 at 11:44
Meh.. I’d watch it, good or bad..
Tracy Benson
July 23, 2015 at 11:56
No! Don’t do it! Adam Sandler must be stopped, don’t give him your money!
Lollies the Laughing Lollipop
July 23, 2015 at 11:59
lol who said im gonna pay for the movie.. haha
Geoffrey Tim
July 23, 2015 at 12:09
^^^^ This.
Stop funding covert terrorism.
Admiral Chief in Skellige
July 23, 2015 at 12:09
“puts the “no” in nostalgia”
*dies
Dutch Matrix
July 23, 2015 at 12:14
I thought this might have been something good. Then I saw Sandler linked to it. My Nope meter went to Warp 19
Gavin Mannion
July 23, 2015 at 13:04
I guess this is a bad time to say that I actually like Adam Sandler…
The Cobbler wasn’t bad for a fun movie and Happy Gilmore is still the best movie ever made…
Andre116
July 23, 2015 at 13:30
He used to be good and Happy Gilmore was one of his better films. Unfortunately he and Eddie Murphy went downhill when they started making family friendly movies to try and cash in on the bigger audience.
Skyblue
July 23, 2015 at 14:22
The Wedding Singer, Happy Gilmore, Little Nicky, 50 First Dates, Spanglish, Punch Drunk Love, Airheads… he had a few decent movies some time ago. Seriously lost his way in the last decade.
Werner Ackermann
July 24, 2015 at 02:09
Cobbler was a pleasant surprise, and Pixels is at the very least in the top 50% of movies I’ve seen the last year.
NotBatpanda
July 23, 2015 at 14:36
Much disappoint. The Batpanda was looking forward to this.
Iusedtobe(a)regular
July 24, 2015 at 15:07
I enjoyed Blended and Grown ups but unfortunately it would seem these days that for every good movie Adam Sandler makes, he makes two or three terrible ones. Chuck & Larry, Zohan and Grown ups 2 immediately come to mind.