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Big Stan

Rob Schneider, David Carradine, Jennifer Morrison

"I am sitting in the smallest room of my house.  I have your review before me. In a moment it will be behind me.” – A note sent by composer Max Reger to a critic after a nasty review.

        For the most part movie critics are about as useful as a one-legged Radio City Music Hall Rockette. Most Americans regard what we write as if Ann Coulter was addressing the Anti-Defamation League.  If you do not believe me, I have two words for you, Rob Schneider.  The Saturday Night Live alum has been the bane of critics for a decade-and-a-half now.   His career rotten tomatoes freshness rating is only 19 percent.  The best of any film in which he is the main star has done is The Animal, which only 31 percent of critics could recommend. His movies have been called “utterly innocuous and instantly forgettable,” “disasters from start to finish,” and “disposable.” Critics have lambasted him, claiming he would not have a movie career if it was not for his friendship with mega-superstar Adam Sandler.  As one critic noted, “[Producer] Adam Sandler is a generous friend to Rob Schneider but a sadist to the rest of us.” Another critic stated, “Deep down, I realized the harsh reality of my situation: I would leave the theater with a lower I.Q. than when I entered.” Chicago Sun-Times Pulitzer Prize winning critic Roger Ebert and Schneider have engaged in an extremely public verbal war the last few years, with Ebert noting, “If he's going to persist in making bad movies, he's going to have to grow accustomed to reading bad reviews." (When Ebert was recovering from a cancerous salivary gland last year, Schneider in an act of generosity sent a bouquet of flowers to the critic with a note, from "Your least favorite actor, Rob Schneider.")

That said, Schneider’s comedies always make a tidy profit, while costing almost nothing to make. They are never blockbusters, but usually take in between $45 million and $93 million before hitting the rich fields of DVD.  They might be awful low-brow flotsam and jetsam, with all the intelligence of an ADD-ridden third grader, but his films keep the lights on at the studio and buys a new BMW for the executive.  While a haven for fart jokes, bathroom humor, and sexual escapades, Schneider might not be Will Ferrell or Jack Black, but the 5’7 comedian is laughing all the way to the bank.  Films like The Animal, Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo, The Hot Chick, and The Benchwarmers, seem to be what the American people want.  He might have won the 2005 Worst Actor Razzie Award, but there is a reason he is in three films coming out in 2008 and it is a pretty good bet that each one of them will make money.  Americans like mindless, dumb crap and Rob Schneider gives it to them in a silver doggie bowl.

All of Schneider’s films are about as deep as the children’s wading pool in Munchkinland, and are usually founded on an incredibly stupid premise, something that was probably sketched on a cocktail napkin at two in the morning.  The Animal was the story of a man who was transformed into an animal.   Deuce Bigalow tells the tale of a fish tank cleaner who becomes a male gigolo to pay off a debt, but because he is Rob Schneider, he can only score with the lowest level of female humanity.  The Hot Chick is a creepy Freaky Friday.  The Benchwarmers: nerds seek self-respect on the softball field.  Big Stan is no different.  Okay, are you ready for the humorous premise?  Little Rob Schneider, who looks like the before picture in a Charles Atlas ad, is an ass-kicking tough guy. That is right, Rob is tougher than a $2 steak and, wait, wait, here it is, he is the toughest guy in prison, you know, the place that is filled with killers, gang members, skinheads, and Republicans.  I know, I know, the script almost writes itself.  What could transform loveable, goofy Rob into a backside whooping machine?  The fear of Man Rape. Nothing is more PG-13 family friendly than dropping soap in the shower jokes.  Rob is a low-level real estate con artist named Stan Minton who is about to go to prison for fraud.  With fears of repeating a Senator Larry Craig visit to an airport restroom every evening in his head, Stan hires a mysterious Kung Fu master to train him, none other than Kwai Chang Caine, Bill, David Carradine, in a parody of the roles that made him famous.  If anyone can teach Stan how to be a warrior, and more importantly keep his backside “exit only,” it is Carradine.  Leaving behind his trophy wife, Mindy (Jennifer Morrison – “House M.D.”), Stan heads to the big house and, of course, is soon the cock of the walk.  You know you are in trouble when you are more interested in the cameos than the actual plot. I entertained myself by recognizing mixed martial artists Don Frye, Randy Couture and Bob Sapp, Rapper Lil Rob, Sally Kirkland, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In’s Henry Gibson, M. Emmet Walsh, Dr. Drew Pinsky, G4’s Olivia Munn, Marcia Wallace (Carol Kester Bondurant in “The Bob Newhart Show”), football running back Ahman Green, and about half of Schneider’s family.  (Basically all the cameos that were too low rent to get into Adam Sandler’s Longest Yard.) With sodomy being taken care of, Stan becomes the bully of the cell block, the man who brings peace to the gangs.  He has only one thing left to fear, the corrupt warden with an evil scheme.  You always have to have an evil warden.

This movie is a double-barreled shotgun of badness because, not only does Rob Schneider star, but he is also directing the film.   Add to this devil’s caldron that Rob was suffering from food poisoning and heat exhaustion throughout the shoot. Across America critics are consulting their thesaurus for the two dollar versions of the words “sucks,” “awful,” and “eye sore” and chomping at the bit to show their verbal gymnastics when it comes to this film.  I am sure that several of their comments will find their way into Schneider’s hands, which will get to him as he makes his way to the bank to cash a rather large check.  I do not understand why audiences flock to Rob Schneider films, but they do.  Big Stan, like his other films, is dumb, painful to watch in places, and for the most unkind thing that I can say, it is just not funny in places.  Yet, Schneider can take comfort in the fact that he can fuel up his private jet, recline in homes that his critics could not afford to smell the air of, and get backrubs from silicone-enhanced women that cannot even spell “Ebert.”  Critics have always been around, the whole world is a Norwegian grandmother and these criticisms can get to talented individuals who are not in Schneider’s position.  I am reminded of a young Rudyard Kipling, who submitted an article to the editor of the San Francisco Examiner.  The editor rejected the column and sent a note that stated, “I’m sorry, Mr. Kipling, but you just don’t know how to use the English language.  This isn’t a kindergarten for amateur writers.”  No one remembers this critical editor, but Kipling went on to win the Nobel Prize for Literature eight years later for “The Man Who Would be King.” 

Verdict: A Typically Awful Schneider Film