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Mr. Deeds
EMAILPRINTColumbia Pictures / Sony Pictures Entertainment
Generally unfavorable reviews
Based on 33 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 55 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Romance
Written by:
Tim Herlihy
Clarence Budington Kelland (short story Opera Hat)
Robert Riskin (film Mr. Deeds Goes to Town)
Directed by: Steven Brill
Release Date:
Theatrical: June 28, 2002
DVD: October 22, 2002
Running Time: 91 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for language including sexual references, and some rear nudity
Starring Adam Sandler, Winona Ryder, John Turturro, Steve Buscemi, Jared Harris, Peter Gallagher, Allen Covert, and Conchata Ferrell
In this homage to the 1936 Frank Capra classic "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town," Adam Sandler plays Mr. Deeds, a young man from the small town of Mandrake Falls, NH who inherits controlling interest in a massive media corporation from his deceased uncle.
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Little Nicky Without a Paddle
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Boston Globe Wesley Morris
Armed with a dinner theater accent and hair that looks like an LP melted on his head, Turturro pockets the picture. As a demonstration of his newly accessed maturity and benevolence, Sandler helps him do it.
Miami Herald Connie Ogle
Surprisingly sweet and, dare we say it, old-fashioned, with an engaging sense of humor that's a definite improvement on lame, lowbrow efforts such as "Little Nicky."
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
The supporting cast is almost uniformly good, from Conchata Ferrell as a sympathetic waitress to Erick Avari as a corporate type with a surprisingly big heart and a hidden silly streak. Turturro relishes his quiet overplaying and steals the bulk of his scenes.
Read Full Review >USA Today Mike Clark
If Sandler felt compelled to take on a role immortalized by Gary Cooper, at least it wasn't as "Sergeant York," "Lou Gehrig" or the sheriff in "High Noon."
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
Sandler nimbly steps into the role created by Cooper and makes it his nebbishy own, something that cannot be said for Ryder's attempt to rethink the Arthur part. Ryder is lovely, but perhaps too sincere an actress to play a wiseacre.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
Mr. Deeds, is -- perhaps predictably -- pretty much of a disaster. It's a bit like someone scrawling a mustache on the Mona Lisa.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
Mr. Deeds is flat, except on those rare occasions when Sandler reverts to form or when John Turturro steals one of many scenes.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan
Though it's enjoyable, you can't help but feel the squandered situations and talent, flattened by mediocre writing and direction. Scoff if you will, but the gifted Sandler and his audience deserve better.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
The film owes as much to Caddyshack as to Capra.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
An idiot variation on Frank Capra's ''Mr. Deeds Goes to Town,'' might have been thrown together in even less time than it takes Sandler to get dressed in the morning; it feels sort of like the dumbest corporate comedy of 1987.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Joshua Rothkopf
Sandler adapts his sweet-natured doofus shtick to this remarkably faithful remake of Frank Capra's 1936 rube-in-the-big-city comedy Mr. Deeds Goes to Town--which suggests that Capra may have invented dumb movies before their time.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Michael Dequina
Not that the lackluster love story will matter any to the Sandler faithful, who are there to see the star beat people up and work his regular joe mojo on snooty types; those viewers will certainly get their fill and then some.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
Utterly predictable, thoroughly sentimental and -- worse -- not all that funny. It makes your average episode of "Third Rock From the Sun" look like the edgy mutant offspring of John Waters and Ingmar Bergman.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
Turturro is the one thing that's right with the movie. Perhaps the weakest thing about the new "Deeds" is its utter lack of a strong viewpoint and real emotion.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
There's no chemistry between Deeds and Babe, but then how could there be, considering that their characters have no existence, except as the puppets in scenes of plot manipulation.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jack Mathews
Something's wrong with the math here -- the inheritance of the story's small-town hero is enlarged from $20 million to $40 billion, yet the new movie isn't worth the price of a Depression-era ticket.
TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
This is a terrible movie in its own right, tasteless and condescending -- if Sandler's character is an Everyman, than the Everyman of today is a boorish jackass
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
Adam Sandler does Frank Capra wrong. His unfunny remake stomps all over the honest values and endearing qualities of the original.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
The remake stumbles from a ragged start into a child's garden of worses -- worse than the original in more ways than you could imagine.
LA Weekly Hazel-Dawn Dumpert
Sandler is -- à la "The Wedding Singer" -- in his washout romantic mode here, and no amount of spastic-colon jokes, cartoon violence or good-buddy cameos (Al Sharpton, John McEnroe) can distract from the fact that Gary Cooper he ain't.
Read Full Review >The New York Times A.O. Scott
Mr. Deeds is mostly terrible, a shambles of a comedy that looks as if it was shot by a tabloid news crew.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Stephen Hunter
Crazy, ugly and scary. In fact, a sense of the grotesque runs thought the film; an extended joke about Sandler's black, dead foot (from frostbite as a kid) borders on something you find in John Waters.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine Peter Rainer
Hollywood movies are once again taking on the job that Andy Griffith–era TV sitcoms used to fill, touting homespun values in Never Land.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone Peter Travers
It's not just that the movie itself is wicked awful, it's that Mr. Deeds brings out the worst in Adam Sandler.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
The projectors in the theater practically shut down with boredom.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
This is another of those post-Saturday Night Live vehicles in which ineptitude and laziness are supposed to be taken as irony: It's not bad, it's "bad." Actually, it's "terrible":
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
What's most interesting about this new film is how lacking it is in any of the things, from humor to emotion to halfway decent acting, we might go to a movie for. There's not even enough here to get mad at.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Robert Wilonsky
A torturous, mawkish, ill-conceived remake.
Village Voice Michael Atkinson
Stay home. Your entertainment-seeking efforts would be better expended perusing old phone books. The white pages.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 6.3 (out of 10) based on 55 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Joe Mamma gave it a9:
Loved it, why is Adam Sandler so looked down upon by critics. Not just this movie but in general.
kitty gave it a6:
This is the only movie I have actually liked Adam Sandler in, so that's pretty self-explanitory.
Ciaran G. gave it a7:
Quite good movie! Worth watching if you're looking for something funny. If you liked Adam Sandler's other films, you'll probably love this.
Charles M. gave it a10:
There are some of the funniest scenes ever produced in a movie. Don't take it to serious or compare to anything else.
Frank O. gave it a5:
A silly romantic comedy that barely kept my interest; Peter Gallagher and John Turtorro were stars of movie, what is with all the anger & violence from Sandler?
Big K. gave it a5:
Not laugh out loud wet your pants funny, but it wasn't dreadful. A little twee though.
Brett D. gave it a10:
Mr. Deeds is the best movie ever!! I have watched around 30 times and I still love it. All my friends like the movie as well.
