Adam Sandler may hit more than he misses as an actor, but in a film featuring his unique style of humor but performed by actors lacking his unique charm, Sandler’s Happy Madison Productions films almost always seem to fall flat. Strange Wilderness is no exception to this general rule of thumb.
The mind-numbingly banal and flat script features idiocy rather than wit, substitutes plain dumbness for zany comic antics and as a result is certainly not a film that’s going to inspire you to break out the HDTV, 7.1 Surround Sound system and the home theater seating.
Strange Wilderness exists in an alien somewhere between Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom and It’s Pat. Steve Zahn, whose career began so promisingly with That Thing You Do!, is once again slumming it for a paycheck as he stars in this film about young punk whose dad was a Marlon Perkins-esque legend in Animal Planet-style fare, and who inherited the show from his father after his old man kicked the bucket.
Unfortunately, Zahn plays a moron with a bunch of loser friends who’ve taken over the show as an excuse to smoke pot and get paid for not really working while traveling the globe, and who think ad-libbing porn-film dialog while lions mate is the height of educational television. Zahn is supposed to be a bit of a tortured soul trying to emerge from the long shadowy legacy of wildlife television cast by his father, but in truth, the film doesn’t push the point that hard because it’s simply too unbelievable that a guy could be that big a screw-up and still think his efforts are worthy of his father’s legacy.
A bunch of Sandler hangers-on fill out the cast, virtually none of whom are recognizable outside of their extras roles in Sandler-produced films, though in fairness Ernest Borgnine, Robert Patrick and Harry Hamlin are all featured in unfortunate, potentially career-damaging cameos. That’s because this is the sort of film that, when watching it, one might be inclined to suddenly stand up and scream, “I’m losing IQ points just by watching this crap!”
So, best to watch it at home, then, if you’re into that kind of self-inflicted wounding. To be honest, it’s hard to imagine even Adam Sandler making this script sparkle, despite his trademark charm. In fact, script choice may be one of Sandler’s biggest strengths; when a script is worthy of him appearing in it as the star, you know it’s a Happy Madison flick that isn’t going to suck, at the very least.
But Sandler seems to recognize doggerel scripts well enough to know when to pass on them personally and have his hangers-on, like Rob Schneider and Steve Zahn, star in them. If you see the Happy Madison logo on a film and it’s not followed by “starring Adam Sandler,” pass on it and save yourself the pain. And with Strange Wilderness, that would be my advice; steer well clear of this steaming pile of lawn fertilizer, as you’d be more entertained by watching Bindi the Jungle Girl on Discovery Kids and Animal Planet; at least the humor of Bindi Irwin, age nine, is more sophisticated and downright funny than anything featured in Strange Wilderness.
