Punch-Drunk Love

Winner of the Best Director Prize at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival, "this misfit love story of disconnected people trying to find one another in an antagonistic world is a comedy of discomfort and rage that turns unexpectedly sweet and pure." Adam Sandler gives an amazing and unusual performance as Barry Egan, a socially impaired owner of a small novelty business, who is dominated by seven sisters and is unlikely to find love unless it finds him. When a mysterious woman comes into his life, his emotions go haywire, fluctuating between uncontrollable rage, lust and self-doubt. "Punch-Drunk Love leaves you addled, a little dizzy and overcome by a pleasing, unplaceable sensation." "A romantic comedy as wonderful as it is strange that expands the genre to its absurdist outer limits and makes us believe." From the writer/director of Boogie Nights and Magnolia, Punch-Drunk Love is a dark, lovely and unique film experience.

Adam Sandler takes a shot at critical respectability with Punch-Drunk Love, a movie by director Paul Thomas Anderson (Boogie Nights, Magnolia). Sandler plays Barry Egan, a lonely small businessman who calls a phone sex line one night, only to find himself the victim of an extortion scheme the next day--the very same day on which he goes out on a date with the woman who may be the love of his life (the utterly delightful Emily Watson). Barry is a lot like Sandler's popular comic characters--socially maladept, prone to violence, always on the brink of embarrassment--but here Sandler plays it real; the result is both off-putting and sympathetic. Anderson's writing skills, unfortunately, are not as strong as his visual sense. Punch-Drunk Love has many strengths (including great supporting actors Philip Seymour Hoffman and Luis Guzmán), but ultimately fizzles out. --Bret Fetzer