Review - You Don't Mess With the Zohan

Zohan Dvir is a Israeli Special Forces Soldier who in uhappy with all of the fighting in the "holy land." Zohan who has become so disillusioned with the constant ongoing war, fakes his own death so that he can live out his one true dream, to become a hairstylist in New York City.


You Don't Mess With the Zohan, directed by Dennis Dugan (Problem Child, Saving Silverman, and The Benchwarmers), feels like a film funnyman Adam Sandler would have made ten years ago. It is filled with very childish humor, laced with sexual innuendous, and the character seems far too similar to the likes of Waterboy, Billy Madison, and his old SNL characters Opera Boy or Canteen Boy. Zohan is filled with cheap laughs throughout, most which fall flat and is overall, only midly amusing.

Adam Sandler doesn't seem like Adam Sandler unless he is overboard and over-the-top and here in You Don't Mess With the Zohan, Sandler is very typical in his performance. His character Zohan, feels very gay (his style of dress and hair & all his disco references), has an overly-stuffed crotch (supposedly his pubic hair), seems to be something out of the bionic man (which is funny at first, but quickly fades), and is something of a ladies man (in Isreal he nails every hot chick, in the U.S. he nails every fat chick). Another aspect to his character was the terrible accent, Adam Sandler should stick to retarded or child-like voices, Zohan was an awful overdone Isreali. Rob Schneider who is in practically every Sandler film, plays his normal character with a new wig on and the same crappy accent too. Not just Adam and Rob's accents, but all of the accent's throughout the film were pure shit! A lot of the laughs really relied on the accent and most fell hard and fast!

You don't Mess With the Zohan was overall a real disapointment (From the trailers, I wasn't expecting much). Adam Sandler in his younger years was really funny for me. Recently, his stuff has been quite the opposite, far too formulaic, and I have been liking him less and less. Maybe it has to do with my age, and I am growing out of the childish and slapstick humor. But then again, I felt 'Grandma's Boy' was hilarious and that too is a Happy Madison production.

I will give Sandler credit role getting into shape for the film, he actually has defined muscle tone, compared to his normal jello look. Like the Love Guru, Zohan spent too much of the time relying on cheap jokes that were over used. Zohan had one too many hummus jokes in it, and none of them were funny in the first place. Sandler used shock value with having Zohan offer his clients a "bang" after their hairstyle, but this gag too soon grew very annoying! Sandler simply missed the mark on Zohan. Like some of the old SNL skits, Zohan would be hiliarious in small 4 to 5 minutes sketches, but in a 113 minute movie, it loses its steam much too quickly to hold the viewers attention. Finally, You Don't Mess With the Zohan was a bad attempt at Sandler trying a new character. The movie is hard to watch and feels way too similar to his older roles in style. You might try making it through Zohan when it hits cable, outside of that, skip it.