Besides being one of the best movies I saw last year, P.T. Anderson's Punch-Drunk Love was also one of the best pieces of film criticism I encountered. Many were taken with how Anderson fleshed out Adam Sandler's comic persona with sympathy and uncanny psychological detail, but I was even more impressed with how the film placed Sandler in the context of classic Hollywood cinema.

J. Hoberman theorized in the Village Voice that the blue suit Sandler wore in that film was chosen to evoke memories of Jerry Lewis. Anderson later said it was a reference to Fred Astaire's costume in The Bandwagon, but I'm more inclined to side with Hoberman: Sandler's trademark characteristics––a mixture of lowbrow comedy and sentimentality, relentless mugging, and the tendency to come across as a spastic idiot savant––do have a lot in common with Lewis'. And Anderson's success (intentional or otherwise) in making me seriously consider Sandler alongside one of the great perfectionists of comic filmmaking had me secretly excited for the star's next movie.

Anger Management, that new movie, pleasantly resembles in some respects the classics that Lewis made with director Frank Tashlin in the 50s and 60s. It clearly favors innovative gags over character, and the lack of narrative focus allows the film to touch on as many disparate hot-button cultural issues as possible. I don't know if this is a compliment or not, but I can't think of any other recent movie that addresses all of the following: post-9/11 security concerns, new-age therapy, yuppie monogamy, the advertising industry, hate crime legislation, and even the subgenre of plot-twist movies inspired by The Sixth Sense (The movie concludes with a surprise so arbitrary it makes you realize how arbitrary these surprises are in other, more serious films).

In a brilliant casting decision, the movie also manages some self-reflexive satire. Jack Nicholson co-stars as the maniacal therapist assigned to supervise Sandler after he's been wrongly charged for aggressive behavior on an airplane. Nicholson approaches the role with the gusto of an actor who no longer has anything to prove, delivering lines like "It's hard for me to be myself when I'm about to explode in my pants" with knowing shamelessness. The resulting mix of effortless charisma and ugly self-parody (His character is, of course, a womanizer with an unexpected violent streak) reminded me of John Wayne's distressing post-Rio Bravo roles; for its off-handed insights into what it means to have a movie star's legacy, it's a great performance.

As for Sandler himself, Anger Management did little to convince me that he is the successor to Jerry Lewis. And unlike many of his critics, I don't think that his persona is the source of his failings. It's Sandler's laziness, his refusal to work with a filmmaker interested challenging the persona (Paul Thomas Anderson aside) that does him in. Lewis' screen persona was also fairly limited, but his collaborations with Tashlin––as well as his own directorial efforts––revealed an innovative visual sensibility.

Peter Segal, the credited director of Anger Management, is not interested in finding a new language for film comedy. This is because he is a hack.

There are scenes in the film that border on greatness but Segal ruins them with formless pacing and pointless editing. Consider, for example, an extended episode featuring Heather Graham: Dining out, Nicholson's Dr. Rydell inexplicably turns into pure id and dares Sandler's put-upon hero into picking up the pretty woman sitting at the bar (Graham) with a sexist come-on line. Sandler approaches nervously, Nicholson cheers him on, and Graham sits by oblivious. This is a great set-up, yet Segal films it entirely in close-ups, thus missing the comic potential (not to mention suspense) of filming the actors in relation to one another.

The scene develops well anyway, with Graham taking Sandler back to her place and then exposing herself––literally and figuratively––to be an obsessive neurotic incapable of accepting a compliment. The content is a clever update of the terrifying seduction scene that Lewis played so well, and Graham brilliantly hints at the uncomfortable human truths in the scenario. Yet Segal insists on cutting to shots of faces whenever the dialogue begins to build any momentum. Simply put, the human face is rarely as funny as the human body––and it is especially less funny than two human bodies.

In contemporary Hollywood, all roads seem to lead to corporate interests, with close-ups of movie stars' faces becoming akin to celebrity product-placement. Suspiciously, the few times when Segal proves himself adept at filming in the difficult format of CinemaScope (wasted on Anger Management, I presume, because it makes for an enticing, marketable DVD feature) is in using the extra-wide frame to subtly advertise the film's numerous sponsors. Some of the most memorable shots in this film include a Heineken truck driving across the screen and the interior of a bowl of Alpha-Bits. It goes without saying that Frank Tashlin––who brilliantly used widescreen to further his satire of the advertising world in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter––would not be pleased.

Even more offensive is the film's decision to whore itself out to Leo Burnett Associates, whose ugly "Army of One" ad campaign is featured throughout Anger Management. Thousands have protested the Chicago offices of Leo Burnett Associates in response to these ads, and rightfully so. In specifically targeting minority and working-class citizens to join the U.S. Army, the corporation markets a racist and classist double-think that only justifies negative perceptions of the country's armed forces. I'm surprised that Sandler, one of the most popular actors in America, didn't consider the implications of featuring this sponsor.

In the end, my reasons for being unable to warm to Sandler's comedies are quite similar to my reasons for disliking Leo Burnett. Sandler's films seem predicated on creating situations that justify his lashing out (often violently) at other people. Anger Management is something of a victory in his filmography to the extent that it calls into question his persona's angry tendencies. Nonetheless, it sticks to the worldview of his other films in that it condones the bashing of gays, defenders of cultural sensitivity, and the working class––because all of these groups are made to seem aggressive and callow.

Politically incorrect humor can be fun, even liberating. Anger Management justifies this position in one of its comic centerpieces in which Sandler and Nicholson beat up a school of Buddhist monks. Yet while the comedies of Mel Brooks ask us to throw up our hands and admit, "Yep, we're all jerks," Sandler's comedies say instead, "No, you're all jerks, and I'm rich."