I’m not quite sure how to take Punch-Drunk Love. It’s different right from the start, when it opens without any titles. Barry (Adam Sandler) is on the phone discussing plastic breakage and offering his home phone number to a clearly nonplussed vendor.

Then a strangely timed accident, a mysteriously appearing harmonium and a quirky woman enter the picture, setting off a train of events that includes strangely timed accidents and quirky women, with the odd harmonium reference.

If it all sounds weird, that’s because it is. But it’s an enjoyable ride. I let some of my analysis faculties take a rest while I took great pleasure in imagining how the stereotypical Adam Sandler fan would react to the picture. Perhaps it was best captured by the couple in front of me:

Woman: What the hell…
Man (overlapping): What the fuck was that?

This entry was posted on Friday, November 8th, 2002 at 1:09 pm and is filed under Film.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.