Mr Deeds goes to town again

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">When Hollywood runs short of ideas—which it does with alarming frequency nowadays—the studio bosses inevitably scramble for the good old classics. Hence, Frank Capra’s memorable <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Mr Deeds Goes To Town</span> (1936) gets the slick-and-chic treatment. Frankly, this turns out to be an exercise in futility.<br />Adam Sandler, the posterboy for pubescent silliness, reprises the role originated by the legendary Gary Cooper.A travesty of the original, his <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Mr Deeds</span> turns out to be a comedy that might evoke more tears of regret than laughter.<br />Sandler is a small-town pizza parlour owner. Endowed with the American values of altruism and loyalty, he nurtures only one ambition—to write greeting card verses. But a nobler destiny awaits Mr Deeds. His life is transformed when he inherits a vast fortune upon the death of his uncle, who’s a publishing magnate. <br />So the pizza-boy goes off to live in his benefactor’s New York mansion and gains control of a media conglomerate. Soon enough, Deeds has to contend with the Machiavellian machinations of corporate rivals, lawyers and assorted city demons.<br />He also attracts the attention of a tabloid TV reporter (Ryder). The rest of the caper follows the backwoods do-gooder as he confronts—and triumphs over—metropo-litan venality. Strewn with buffoonery and puerile humour, the film squanders every comedic possibility. The screenplay as well as the direction is pedestrian.<br />In the title role, Sandler is a one-note wonder. Whether he’s into fisticuffs or flinging cats out of a burning building, he is singularly unfunny. As the unethical newshound, Winona Ryder fares only marginally better. <br />Devoid of any redeeming feature, <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Mr Deeds</span> hardly encourages us to go out to town, to the movies. Out, out remakes please.</div> </div>