Everybody loves an underdog, and Adam Sandler clearly portrays one in his latest film, The Waterboy. The title character, Bobby Coucher, is a thirty-something year-old nitwit who lives life as a mommy's boy in a backwoods bayou cabin. When not at home suffering under his mother's compulsive attention, he is the waterboy on the college football field sidelines offering the most pure, satisfying, and thirst-quenching water that science can produce. In now typical Sandler fashion, the audience is once again subjected to his stock stupidity, jutted jaw, poutty lip, and pseudo accent that he uses in a hackneyed way to convey his estrangement from the football elitists. Naturally, Bobby and his water receive unmerciful antagonistic abuse from the team. Even the coach, played by Jerry Reed, is no friend, and fires him at practice for being such a nuisance, despite eighteen years of faithful service.
A sullen Bobby scoots home on his ride-on lawnmower to whine to his controlling mother, played by Kathy Bates, who is given to spouting the worst of Christian cliché lines like, "She's a godless Jezebel" and "It's the devil!" Although not without her humorous moments, Bates's character is another of Hollywood's disappointingly negative stereotypes of Christians. Without her permission, Bobby is soon applying to be the waterboy at Louisiana State where Henry Winkler presides as the coach of a team on a forty game losing streak. In a series of loony events, Bobby's pent-up frustrations at being put down by everyone are finally given a release when he aggressively ploughs down one of the cockiest players. In an unbelievable, yet predictable, leap-of-faith moment, Winkler decides to enlist Bobby as a sort of secret weapon running back. And of course, despite the team's continuing ridicule, he leads the Muddogs in a series of fantastically unbelievable victories.
Although Christians, Cajuns, coaches, football players, college students, faculty, mothers, and fanatic football fans are all depicted as being unfathomably stupid and shallow, there are a few funny moments in a film that could have had more. Most of the real excitement in this film arises from Bobby's success on the football field in absurd scenes that, despite their implausibility, really get your adrenaline pumping. The rest of the plot serves as a shallow, wishy-washy background story that offers some mildly amusing situations, but few hearty laughs. (Including the completely incomprehensible love story between Bobby and his paroled gal pal played likeably by rising star Fairuza Balk.) We really do love to see an underdog conquer in spite of the obstacles and against the odds. The tried and true metaphor equating personal victory with success on the sports field is unabashedly intact and effective. If you check your brain at the door, you will have fun, especially during the well-filmed football scenes where Bobby decimates his opponents.
Given the success of his other goofy films like Happy Gilmore, Sandler is becoming a sure commodity in this type of film. His other films were crowd pleasers, and he hasn't strayed too far from the safety of that bench. Although his goofy portrayal of Bobby Coucher is surprisingly flat and unconvincing, it does at times approach a level of endearment, but not nearly as charming here as he was in The Wedding Singer. Nor does he offer any of his trademark silly songs. This movie was made despite rumors of skepticism about its viability and yet it has already become a big hit nationwide, proving that Sandler himself is no underdog in the box office. Though ultimately insipid and not very grounded in the best theatrical and cinematic conventions, The Waterboy formula succeeds because it gets you rooting for the good guy with all the requisite hoots, hollers and warm fuzzies.
Steven Stuart Baldwin (3/20/99)
