Review in a Hurry: Sentimental simplicity meets big-budget effects in this cute kid's tale, with Adam Sandler doing what comes naturally—playing a lovable lout with a heart of gold. Awww.
The Bigger Picture: Skeeter Bronson (Sandler) is underemployed as a hotel handyman. He whines plenty about his underachieving life but doesn't do a darn thing about it.
Things take a turn for the better when Skeeter babysits his niece and nephew: The wild stories he tells them start to parallel his daily life, with happy endings to boot. But when a big opportunity falls in his lap, he relies too heavily on storytime fate and not enough on his own ambition.
Smell a good bedtime lesson? Follow your nose to the theater, then, for a moralistic tale that comes with a wacky, entertaining, laugh-out-loud script. Stories also features a total-pro cast (Russell Brand, Richard Griffiths, Guy Pearce, Keri Russell—I could go on). Everyone looks like they're having an insane amount of fun.
Leading man Sandler has done street-smart goofball a million times over, but the guy also knows how to play emotion. He brings a lot of heart to his performance; that keeps you on his side, even when Skeeter is at his most harebrained.
The 180—a Second Opinion: The bedtime stories come to life with outstanding production values and expensive effects, and the actors are hilarious in their various incarnations. Still, the stories fall flat with each successive telling—the dazzling effects upstage the comedy.