'Happy Gilmore 2' review: Sequel has none of the original's rabble-rousing spirit

WHAT IT’S ABOUT After nearly 30 years, Adam Sandler delivers a sequel to his much-loved 1996 comedy "Happy Gilmore." The Netflix film finds Sandler returning in the title role of a hopeless hockey player who brought his working-class rage to the polite sport of golf. Today, he’s a widower supporting five children on a supermarket clerk’s salary. Hoping to send his talented daughter Vienna (Sunny Sandler, the star’s real-life kid) to an expensive French ballet school, Gilmore reenters the golf game — only to find that the sport is under threat from a new generation of unscrupulous players.

MY SAY "Happy Gilmore" is one of the great cult comedies, almost as quotable as "Airplane!" or "Caddyshack." (If you’re a fan, you’re thinking of the famous "breakfast" routine right now.) Sandler was perfectly suited to the part — a tantrum-prone toddler in a grown man’s body — and he surrounded himself with supporting actors whose roles became semilegendary, notably Carl Weathers as the one-handed golf instructor Chubbs, Christopher McDonald as the cocky Shooter McGavin and Bob Barker as a foulmouthed version of himself.

So it’s no overstatement to say that "Happy Gilmore 2” is an event. (Perhaps you’ve seen the excitable coverage on ESPN or the Subway sandwich ads starring McDonald and golfer Bryson DeChambeau.) At the same time, we all know that Sandler is the most wildly inconsistent star in Hollywood. Remember when he generated Oscar buzz for his performance in the searing drama "Uncut Gems" (2019), then followed up with the 2020 abysmal comedy "Hubie Halloween"?

Judged solely by its number of cameos, "Happy Gilmore 2” would be a success. All the Sandler regulars are here, including Kevin Nealon and Rob Schneider.  (Director Kyle Newacheck and Sandler's co-writer, Tim Herlihy, are regulars as well.) Bad Bunny (credited under his real name, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio) plays Oscar, a busser who becomes Gilmore’s caddie. Top-ranked golfer Scottie Scheffler upends his nice-guy image, while PGA champ John Daly plays the Gilmore family’s disheveled human pet ("Don’t forget to feed John Daly three times a day," Gilmore tells the kids). You want more? How about Eminem, Post Malone, Guy Fieri, Travis Kelce and — rather oddly — Margaret Qualley? It’s as if Sandler cast the film by email blast.

And almost nothing here is funny. Ben Stiller returns as Hal, the abusive orderly, now the abusive leader of an AA group. (Those jokes get a little queasy, though Hal has written a self-help book amusingly titled "My Struggle Against Unfairness"). Benny Safdie, who directed Sandler in "Uncut Gems," plays Frank Manatee, leader of Maxi Golf, an MMA-inspired version of the sport; his bad breath is a running gag. (Also oddly, Haley Joel Osment is his star player, Billy Jenkins.) Saddest of all is McDonald’s Shooter, one of the best heavies in comedy history, here utterly wasted. He’s now an escaped lunatic who suddenly mends fences with Gilmore and joins the team.

For all the callbacks, this sequel has none of the original’s rabble-rousing spirit. It’s odd to find Gilmore fighting to save the soul of traditional golf from the Maxi bros. Aren’t they exactly the kinds of disrupters Gilmore used to be? It’s a somewhat cranky and curmudgeonly premise, rather as if the Delta Tau Chis of "Animal House" had suddenly become the honor keepers of the Greek system. Who wants a comedy about a sense of reverence?

As one sportscaster observes during a low moment, Gilmore "took all that goodwill and basically set it on fire." Well said. You’d be better off re-watching the 1996 original, which is right next to this one in your Netflix queue and departs the streaming service on Aug. 1.

BOTTOM LINE Sandler’s sequel to his hole-in-one comedy is an unfortunate slice into the sand.

By Rafer Guzmán

rafer.guzman@newsday.com