“UNCUT GEMS”: Screaming New Yawkers

Adam Sandler

Published December 24, 2019 by Robert W. Butler at Butler’s Cinema Scene

My rating: C+ (Opens wide on Christmas Day)

135  minutes | MPAA rating: R

Funnyman Adam Sandler undergoes a remarkable transformation in  “Uncut Gems.”  He’s really, really effective as a Diamond District hustler whose debts and sins are rapidly closing in on him.

That said, the latest from the writing/directing Safdie Brothers (Benny and Josh) is like having an irate New Yawk cabbie screaming nonstop in your ear for two-plus hours.

Sandler plays Howard Ratner, the middle-aged proprietor of a Manhattan jewelry store.  He calls himself a jeweler but he’s not so much an expert in gemology as he is a full-time con artist, always looking for his next (not necessarily legal) kill.

Howard is an inveterate gambler who always is nurturing a get-rich-quick scheme.  He’s got a furious wife (Idina Menzel) and kids in the ‘burbs,  a girl squeeze (Julia Fox) he keeps in an apartment in the city, and a crushing gambling debt that finds him being stalked by a pair of underworld enforcers  (Tommy Dominik, Keith William Richards).

Howard’s sure that his latest scheme will turn everything around. He has somehow gotten his hands on a “black opal,” a fist-sized gem smuggled out of Africa.  He’s already arranged to have this spectacular rock sold by a prestigious auction house; surely it will leave him set for life. Or at least alive.

Or maybe not.  His streetsmart associate Demany (LaKeith Stansfield) introduces Howard to basketball star Kevin Garnett (playing himself, and most convincingly), who so loves the big opal that he asks to carry it around with him for a few days. He comes to regard it as his good luck charm.

Always looking for an edge, Howard agrees, figuring that a generous gesture now will turn the sports millionaire into a long-term bling buyer.

Kevin Garnett, LaKeith Stansfield, Adam Sandler

Everything that can go wrong — the b-baller won’t give up the gem, the auction house appraises it at a fraction of what Howard believes it is worth — does go wrong.  Howard races around from one disaster to the next, attempting to put out the fires that are eating away at his life, swearing nonstop, cajoling, lying, trying to hide his growing panic.

Some of the situations he gets into are comic — a loan shark (Eric Bogosian) kidnaps Howard from a school play, strips him naked and locks him in the trunk of the family car — but as “Uncut Gems” progresses and our protagonist makes a desperate bet on a sporting event with money he doesn’t have, we can feel the noose tightening.

The Safdies know this milieu inside out and capture the breakneck pace, desperation and bravado of Howard’s world.

But here’s the thing (and this may be Midwest prejudice leaching through)…”Uncut Gems” is exhausting rather than exhilarating. The dialogue is exchanged at drill sergeant volume, most of the characters are loathsome  and at more than two hours the film will, for many, wear out its welcome long before it comes to an end.

Still, you’ve got to give the Safdies credit for looking at Sandler’s long-time obno-kid screen persona and extrapolating how that might mutate into a burned-out, hopeless maturity.

| Robert W. Butler

Read the original review and more reviews at Butler’s Cinema Scene