Bedtime Stories

I can officially say that I do not enjoy Adam Sandler movies. I do not find them funny… at all. I try to give them a chance, thinking they will mature. I find that I am in the minority when it comes to enjoying his movies, but then again I am in the minority for preferring horror films. Honestly, I had forgotten that Sandler was in this, believing it be Ben Stiller instead. Well, when the movie began, I was reminded that I was going to in for an hour and a half of silly voices and a cameo by Rob Schneider. Before you start defending Happy Gilmore as the greatest movie ever made, It wasn’t F.Y.I. I will admit that Bedtime Stories had an enjoyable premise.

The story begins narrated by Jonathan Price who is awesome for those of you who don’t know that already. Price is the owner of a small motel in Los Angeles and father of two young children one being Skeeter, an imaginative boy who grows up to be Adam Sandler. Ever night at bed time, Skeeter’s father would tell him and his sister a bedtime story. Soon, Price is visited by a chubby hotel proprietor who convinces him to sell his hotel and promises to keep Skeeter employed and will one day allow him to run the hotel, as long as he works hard.

Thirty some years pass and the hotel is big and fancy and not hit by the recession at all. Skeeter is employed at the Nothingham Hotel, but as a maintenance man. Well, the pudgy Hotel mogul who bought Skeeter’s fathers motel holds a press conference to announce that he is developing another, grander hotel in L.A. and announces that the hard worker who will be running the joint, is not in fact Skeeter, but the guy from Memento. Saddened by this news, Skeeter is also asked by his sister to babysit her two kids for a week while she goes on an interview in Arizona or somewhere since her job as a Principal will be terminated as her school is being shut down, this is surprisingly not due to budget cuts.

Skeeter shares the babysitting responsibility with his sister’s friend Jill who watches the children during the day. On the first evening, the children ask Skeeter to tell them a bedtime story. Using his frustration at work, he tells a tale set in Medieval England about a servant who is promised a kingdom, but is overlooked. Finding the story dull and lacking a happy ending, the children finish the story for him.

The next day, Skeeter’s life begins to take on elements of the bedtime story, and seeing this as his opportunity to have the management position in the hotel industry he was promised and the girl, Skeeter begins to weave in his desires into the stories, only to find that it is the imagination of the children who are controlling his fate.

I am not even torn about my opinion of this movie, I did not like it. I know it was most likely geared to my age group and was not my genre of choice, but I find that comedy does very little to excite me. If you like Sandler movies, you will definitely not be disappointed but if you are like me and Sandler tends to make you throw objects at the screen, stay far away from this one.