Adam Sandler came up through Saturday Night Live and was always a hit in skits such as the one involving Canteen Boy. Much of Sandler’s humor involved getting angry and throwing tantrums, and his earlier movies took that crass craziness a step further; some people liked it, others didn’t. More recently, Sandler was seen in P.T. Anderson’s Punch-Drunk Love, where he showed that he could act in drama. He was still angry, but his anger was channeled to greater effect. The difference seems to lie in whether he is only acting in a film or is involved in its production as well. Unfortunately, the credits of Click list him as actor and producer.

Sandler plays Michael Newman, a workaholic in the fast lane who is about to burn out but still has time to indulge in cruel pranks and tasteless jokes. He spends no time with his son, not much with his wife (Kate Beckinsale), and sucks up to his CEO (David Hasselhoff) in hopes of becoming a partner. One night, Michael discovers that he can’t work the remote controls of his various pieces of equipment. He tries to turn on the TV and activates the garage door. Fed up, he goes out to buy a universal remote, but the only store open is Bed Bath & Beyond. (I wonder how much they paid for that placement.) Bed Bath has nothing for him, but behind a door labeled Beyond he finds Morty (Christopher Walken), a cross between a mad scientist, a salesman, and something darker. Morty leads Michael to another door, this one marked Way Beyond. Behind that door Morty finds a universal remote, which he gives to Michael.

Michael quickly finds out that his new remote is very powerful. It throws up a menu of his life: It can take him to any part of it, or he can skip the parts he doesn’t like. He does a lot of skipping, even shortening having sex with his wife. He can also mute the sound, freeze a frame, and live parts of his life in slow or fast motion. When he gets in trouble, Morty mysteriously shows up to point the way out. What Michael doesn’t know is that his remote is a learning remote that is also remembering all of his cruel pranks. At this point I realized I was watching a modern version of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. But while Ebenezer Scrooge had three ghosts to deal with, Michael has only Morty -- and a lot more lessons.

Click is advertised as a comedy, but after 30 minutes I realized that it just isn’t funny. The first half of Click is bad boy Sandler in a depiction of Michael’s work life -- a life not only not funny, but full of a cruelty and viciousness that most people would want to escape. At the film’s midpoint he switches to sensitive Sandler, but it is already too late. Then another realization dawned: with another comedian in the main role, this might have been a very sweet movie. Maybe sad sack Bill Murray could have pulled it off, but Sandler does not. By the time Michael began to destroy himself, I no longer cared. How can you care about a man who has subjected you to one of the lamest fart jokes ever put on screen, and, even worse, becomes fat and plays with a big flap of his own loose skin? As Michael’s world crumbles, I thought, Okay, you did this; you deserve what you got.

The other actors almost save the day. Christopher Walken is laugh-out-loud funny as Morty, and Henry Winkler is sometimes amusing as Michael’s father, who is famous for his trick with a quarter. David Hasselhoff plays Michael’s CEO to the hilt, but Kate Beckinsale, possibly the sexiest female star on the screen today, seems wasted altogether.

How about a sequel starring Walken as Morty? That might be interesting -- even funny. The half bag in the rating is for Walken. Otherwise, I give Click only two.

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