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Happy Gilmore is a 1996 American sports comedy film directed by Dennis Dugan and starring Adam Sandler as the title character.
y Gilmore (Adam Sandler) is an aspiring ice hockey player from Waterbury, Connecticut who masters a powerful slapshot that his late father taught him as a child. However, his aggression and poor skating ability render it impossible for him to make any hockey team. His grandmother (Frances Bay), with whom he's lived almost all his life due to an unfortunate hockey-related incident which killed his father, has not paid her taxes for many years.
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Quotations
Announcer: Quite a large and economically diverse crowd here at the Michelob Invitational.
Damn you people. This is golf. Not a rock concert.
I tell you, the real winner today is the city of Portland. Every time I come here it gets harder to leave. I bet you put something to the water.
If I saw myself dressed like that, I'd have to kick my own ass.
Shooter McGavin: Stay out of my way, or you'll pay. Listen to what I say
Stop fraternizing with the help Gilmore. Just hit your ball... if you can find it.
Encyclopedia
Happy Gilmore is a 1996 American sports comedy film directed by Dennis Dugan and starring Adam Sandler as the title character.
Plot
Happy Gilmore (Adam Sandler) is an aspiring ice hockey player from Waterbury, Connecticut who masters a powerful slapshot that his late father taught him as a child. However, his aggression and poor skating ability render it impossible for him to make any hockey team. His grandmother (Frances Bay), with whom he's lived almost all his life due to an unfortunate hockey-related incident which killed his father, has not paid her taxes for many years. As such, she owes $270,000 to the IRS and the house that Happy's grandfather "built with his bare hands" is about to be seized. Grandma Gilmore is forced to temporarily move into a retirement home run as a sweatshop by Hal, the retirement home's sadistic manager (Ben Stiller in an uncredited role). While repossessing Grandma's furniture, a pair of movers challenge Happy to shoot golf balls, and his unorthodox hockey slapshot hits 400 yards three times, winning $40 as a result. When ex-golf pro Chubbs Peterson (Carl Weathers) (who was forced to retire when his hand was bitten off by an alligator) sees Happy's shot, he talks Happy into entering a local tournament by convincing him he can make a lot of money. Happy wins the tournament and earns a spot on the PGA Tour. However, against Chubbs' advice Happy joins the tour immediately after learning he can make enough money to buy back Grandma's house.
On the Tour Happy makes an instant enemy of star pro Shooter McGavin (Christopher McDonald), who sees Happy as a detriment to golf and tries to thwart any attempt to steal his thunder. In addition, Happy discovers that although he has a powerful drive, his putting is terrible, and his violent outbursts and lack of golf etiquette cause him problems, which gives Shooter an opening to ask Doug Thompson, the head of the tour, to expel Happy. Happy's antics are garnering the tour's highest television ratings and bringing more fans into tournaments, and Shooter's request is denied.
However, to help Happy cool down and start acting more professionally tour PR head Virginia Venit (Julie Bowen) is assigned to him by the tour. In addition to a relationship forming between the two, Happy begins to develop a cooler head while continuing to improve in tournaments much to the chagrin of Shooter, who decides to take matters into his own hands and hire Donald, a fan of Shooter's (Joe Flaherty) to heckle Happy at the next tournament, a celebrity pro-am.
At said tournament, where Happy is paired with Bob Barker, Donald takes Happy's focus off his game so much that out of frustration he and Barker have a fight, which Barker wins and is also enough to have Happy suspended from the tour. However, all is not lost as Happy secures an endorsement deal with Subway, which gives him enough money to buy back Grandma's house.
What Happy doesn't know is that the house is being sold at auction, and the situation is made worse when Happy sees that Shooter McGavin has won the auction for the house. Shooter allows Happy to have the house back, but only if he'll quit the tour. After initially accepting, Happy is talked out of it by Virginia, who says Grandma would much rather see Happy succeed at life than get the house back. Happy then makes a bet with Shooter: if Happy finishes higher at the Tour Championship, he gets the house back; if Shooter finishes higher, Happy quits the tour.
Although Shooter agrees to the bet Happy realizes that he needs to get better in a hurry if he wants to win, and seeks out Chubbs. Together they head to a mini-golf course so Happy can improve his putting, which he does. As a token of his gratitude Happy gives Chubbs a present: the head of the alligator that took his hand (which Happy had killed in an earlier tournament). The gift does not have the intent Happy planned on, as Chubbs is startled by it and stumbles back, causing him to fall out an open window to his death.
Determined to win the Tour Championship for Chubbs, Happy goes head-to-head with Shooter. Shooter is stunned that Happy has been keeping up with him, and by the end of the third day of the tournament Happy is leading Shooter. Determined to win the tournament, which he has never done, Shooter once again calls on Donald. The next day Shooter's plan comes into action, as Donald hits Happy with a Volkswagen Beetle, which he proceeds to ram into a television tower at the 18th hole.
Happy is moderately injured and has lost the ability to hit the long drive and as such drops from the lead and trails Shooter by several shots heading into the final holes. However, after applying a lesson from Chubbs he is able to refocus and ties for the lead going to the 18th hole. After Shooter makes his shot for par, the TV tower collapses and blocks Happy's shot for birdie. Happy is forced to play his shot with the tower in the way, and once again uses what Chubbs taught him to make a trick shot to win the Tour Championship and the house.
Shooter is attacked by an angry mob of spectators after he steals the gold jacket from Doug in a fit of hysteria after Happy wins. With a comedic nod to the end of Return of the Jedi, the film closes with Happy being congratulated by the two-handed ghost of Chubbs, Abraham Lincoln, and the alligator.
Cast
Reception
The film overall met with mixed reviews. Roger Ebert said "I guess we are supposed to like Happy Gilmore, yet as played by Sandler, he doesn't have pleasing personality". Rotten Tomatoes critics only gave the movie 55 percent, considering the film rotten.
The Rotten Tomatoes community gave the film 83 percent, considering it fresh. It was also placed at #97 on Bravo's 100 Funniest movies.
Trivia
- The golfer who continuously shakes his head in dismay during the film is Lee Trevino. His only spoken line is: "Grizzly Adams did have a beard."
- PGA Golfer Mark Lye makes an appearance when he welcomes Happy to the pro tour at the cocktail party.
- When Bob Barker was asked to do the fight scene with Sandler, Barker refused at first. He quickly changed his mind when the producers told him he would win the fight. Barker credits his appearance in the movie for revitalizing interest in "The Price is Right", especially among college students. During the fight, Sandler yelled "The Price is wrong, bitch!", which is a parody of the game show's title.
- Joe Sakic makes a cameo appearance in the hockey tryout scene.
- On the DVD are several unshown scenes. One shows Happy returning to the old age home to confront the evil orderly, throwing him out of a window. In another, he gets a non-violent come-back on the guy heckling him on Shooter's orders by exposing his inability to play. This scene shows either an alternate or additional motive for the heckler to later attempt to mow down Happy with his car.
- The fight scene with Bob Barker was frequently shown on the big screen at Cleveland Lumberjacks games after fights during the game. The Lumberjacks were a minor league hockey team for the now-defunct International Hockey League.
- The scene where Happy taunts the mover by saying "Holy shit! You got a hold of that one!" is a reference to Caddyshack, which Adam Sandler claims was a source of inspiration in his career.
- Carl Weathers reprises his role as Chubbs in the movie Little Nicky, where, having gained his hand back, has gone to Heaven after dying and teaches the angels how to dance while playing the piano, while saying his catch phrase, "It's all in the hips."
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