Adam Sandler Lampoons Mel Gibson In "Zohan"

Adam Sandler's new movie "You Don't Mess with the Zohan" comes out Friday, and inside Sandler pokes fun at Mel "sugar tits" Gibson, who uttered antisemitic sentiments when arrested for drunk driving in July 2006. In the film, Sandler plays an Israeli soldier turned New York hairdresser.

Fox writes of the film;

But right up front is this: a two-pronged attack on Mel Gibson for his anti-Semitic comments of a couple of years ago. When Gibson sees "Zohan," I think it's pretty clear he won't be laughing. He probably also won't be doing business with either Sony or Sandler ever again.

I'm quite sure that Sandler doesn't care, and I suppose Sony doesn't either. Gibson is considered pretty much radioactive in Hollywood following his whole Malibu arrest and rant, his subsequent unconvincing mea culpa to Diane Sawyer, and his further sightings in alcohol friendly situations.

But Sandler and writers Judd Apatow and Rob Smigel don't go easy on him. At least twice in "Zohan" they hold Gibson up for ridicule. In one instance he's the punchline for a joke. In another, more explicitly, his movies are used to underscore the neo Nazi rantings of a redneck played by rocker Dave Matthews.

MSNBC writes of Matthews' character:
"A band of Mel Gibson-loving racist rednecks (led by Dave Matthews)"

And from Arizona:
At least Sandler practices equal opportunity offensiveness, mocking stereotypes of Jews and Arabs with equal aplomb, and taking several digs at Mel Gibson and his raging xenophobia.

Decide for yourself when the movie opens. The trailer is below:

Comments

[jalapeno]

Adam Sandler is not a comic genius, his voice is a little hard to take,
but if he makes fun of Mel Gibson, I'm there!!!

[MissKaren]

Save me a seat and I'll share the cost of the popcorn.

To see Mel Gibson skewered after he made a snuff film about the death of Jesus is worth the price of admission.

[RichardWeed]

Israeli terrorist being racist towards Arabs on American soil - so not funny. Has the foot thing become his trademark?

[hartkid]

I hope it doesn't pull any punches on account of any racial distinctions. It'd be nice to have a comedy like Blazing Saddles again. I suppose there's South Park, but come on, when was the last time mainstream Hollywood did anything as brave or as funny as Blazing Saddles?

[EmeraldCityGrl]

Another crappy Sandler movie. Half way through you're ready to chew through your wrists. Never again.

[munkii]

ah, another crappy adam sandler movie, i'll pass

[Rockwell]

This is the first Sandler movie I've actually been interested in seeing. Not looking for a comedy classic but hoping for something to make me smile.

[speakyourmind]

Lighten up, people. It's comedy. Supposed to offend someone if you're doing it right.

[tinkaboutit]

Zohan makes me think of Zion-the religious name for the hill of Jerusalem that only those with the jewish race are allowed to live.

The movie poster of Dont Mess With Zohan while he points a hair dryer directly in your face makes me think of intimidation of non jews.

The clowning on the arabs makes me think this movie is your standard Zionist propaganda designed to brainwash the american public to never ever question racist expansionist Israel.

[prattvictory]

Sandler lampoons Gibson's bad bigotry in a movie that seems to be filled with good bigotry. Gibson's antiSemitism is inexcusable, however it seems Sandler's apparent bigotry towards Arabs is perfectly acceptable.

[nimblehuman]

Unfortunately this reflects the hypocrisy of the entire US policy towards Israel. It is OK to be rabidly bigoted against Arabs and Muslims, but even valid criticisms of Israeli policy are immediately condemned as "anti-Semitism". Adam Sandler's movies are often tasteless and offensive, but this is a whole new level of racist.

[walk0nwalls]

Don't say nothing 'till you see it, Judd is on the credits after all. They're not idiots.

[Plus15]

And of course you know about the movie and "Sandler's apparent bigotry towards Arabs" because?
You haven't seen the movie so how do you know?

[jpcline004]

I'm not a big Sandler fan, by when I found out this is written by Robert Smigel (SNL's TV Funhouse) and Judd Apatow (40 year old virgin, Superbad) I decided I really want to see it.

[RedStateCenterLeft]

Don't think I'll catch it. No Steve Bucemi.

[civilityliberty]

This looks amazingly racist. You really have to ask yourself: would this movie be made if the agent was an Arab and he was humiliating Jews and Anglos?

[HermioneGranger]

Anglos, maybe. Jews, no.

[eahce]

Not in hollywood. Seems to be a double standard.

[unscum]

I really liked the his movie Spanglish.

[AdamWykle]

Based on the previews and trailers I had already made up my mind not to watch this movie as it seemed to be another Sandler attempt at being funny while containing alot of crude Arab stereotypes of terrorism and such, and I generally don't like to give my $10 to movies that promote that.

With that said, I think Arabs will also find it offensive when Sandler labels Arabic & Meditteranean food as "Israeli". Israel was established 60 years ago, these food items have been around for centuries.

[krol]

Somehow I doubt Arabs will find the labeling of any food as Israeli. Food gets passed and mixed into different cultures. The "Arabic & Meditteranean" food of today is not the same as it was centuries ago. Cultures have the blurriest of lines; trying to 'own' one food or another is beyond ridiculous.

Besides that, I haven't seen much about this movie, so I don't know if it contains crude Arab stereotypes of terrorism (not saying that they aren't there - I just haven't seen them). I can see that it has a crude stereotype of an Israeli, though.

[HermioneGranger]

Since there is no cultural difference between Arabs and Israelis, why would they have different food? They are all Middle Easterners.

[AdamWykle]

To label classic Arabic dishes as "Israeli" would be offensive in my opinion. That's like giving Chinese food an American name and labeling it an American dish.

[FatJoe]

They almost had me interested until I saw Rob Schneider stinking up the screen. After that, I had to break out my hazmat suit.