If crass slapstick humor, leading to painful tear-jerking melodrama, interspersed with moments of wit and parody lives up to your taste of cinema, 'Click' is what you should grab at your nearest area theater. Don't however, expect Adam Sandler of Punch-Drunk Love, Anger Management or 50 First Dates to deliver that routine he's so famous for though, to give the guy credit, he does try very hard.
Sandler begins on the right note as Michael Newman, the architect on the fast-track, getting pulled deeper and deeper into the quicksand of ambition and equally further away from his lovable family. And if the marital and job strains were not enough, he has the annoying inability to decipher which of the several remote controls in his house control what leading him to the search for that singular omni-potent remote control.
Enter the eminently likable Christopher Walken as the peculiar Morty from the 'Beyond' section of 'Bed, Bath and Beyond', who hands over to Michael a magical remote. This enables him to selectively replay, freeze or fast-forward past events as he chooses. This allows for great laughs such as his fast-forwarding the extra-long foreplay with his wife played by Kate Beckinsale and his antics with boss David Hasselhoff. However, too good to last, before long, a tragic turn-about makes Michael a helpless being in the hands of the remote further messing up his wrecked family life.
Director Frank Coraci of 'The Wedding Singer' fame does well in keeping the special effects away from Sandler, enabling him his famous goof-ups in this sci-fi comedy. Steve Koren and Mark O'keefe who also wrote the screenplay of 'Bruce Almighty' team up well, particularly in the remote manipulation scenes while Kate Beckinsale provides pleasant eye candy but little else.
However, the latter half of this 98 minute flick requires some will power to get through since the production clearly wants only teary-eyed audiences to leave the movie hall and evidently will go to any extent to ensure this. The soap opera soppiness on Michael's realization of the importance of family would probably 'click' better if presented more subtly. But oops! Its Adam Sandler we're talking about.
