Synopsis

Michael Newman is married and has two terrific kids but he doesn’t get to see them much because he’s putting in long, hard hours at his architectural firm in the elusive hope that his ungrateful boss will one day recognize his invaluable contribution and make him a partner. After staying up all night to work, Michael becomes frustrated when he can’t even figure out which of his remotes will turn on the TV set. Michael sets out to find the perfect device to operate all his electronic equipment and stumbles into the back room of a 'Bed, Bath & Beyond' shop, where an eccentric employee, Morty, gives him an experimental one of a kind souped-up remote control guaranteed to change his life. Morty wasn’t kidding either. Soon Michael is master of his domain, turning on every appliance with the click of a button. Then he discovers the remote has other, more startling functions. It can somehow muffle the barking of the family dog, fast forward through an annoying quarrel with his wife and those moments which keep him from his work.

What The Critics Say

"A fantasy comedy in the tradition of Back to the Future or Groundhog Day... Click delivers profoundly emotional family moments amidst the hysterically clever fantasy gags." Fred Topel ABOUT.COM "Click sells itself as an Adam Sandler comedy full of immature humor (and it is), but the last 30 minutes are brilliant, heartbreaking and emotional." Willie Waffle WAFFLEMOVIES.COM "Walken is so adept and natural as Sandler's guiding light -- and his tormentor -- that he seems to be ad-libbing. It's an artful, endearing performance." Stephen Williams NEWSDAY "Henry Winkler and Julie Kavner play Sandler's parents, and they redeem what they can of Click, although no one could salvage the ruthlessly sentimental later passages." Michael Phillips LOS ANGELES TIMES "It's a flawed film, but most people go to Adam Sandler movies to just unwind and have fun. It works at that level." Mike McGranaghan AISLE SEAT

"Sandler's and Walken's performances make this worth your while." Harvey S Karten COMPUSERVE "Surely, nobody else could package the tragedy of a ridiculous man as a featherweight farce and have it turn into what I suspect will be a major hit. Sandler is young yet, but he could end up one of the genius men in American comedy." Scott Foundas L.A. WEEKLY "A happy convergence of silly and smart gives Adam Sandler one of his best comic vehicles yet." Kirk Honeycutt HOLLYWOOD REPORTER "I really enjoyed "Click", and the fact that it surprised me as much as it did in terms of the tone of the film really turned it from another typical Happy Madison production into the league of Sandler’s better films like The Wedding Singer. Definitely check it out if you get a chance, but I think that people are going to be pretty divided on this one. FOUR STARS." Adam Weeks WEBWOMBAT "Click actually does manage to rustle an emotion or too from the material – for one thing, the film’s character-aging makeup is extraordinarily realistic; for another, Coraci doesn’t linger too long on the glossy serious bits, so they register with warts-and-all resonance." Luke Buckmaster INFILM

The Inside Story There's an old saying that warns: "be careful of what you wish for; you just might get it" (originaly thought to be "be careful what you wish for, lest it come true"). It's a warning Michael Newman should have heeded in Adam Sandler's latest film, the comedy "Click". Sandler's character is a workaholic who devotes most of his waking time to his job while neglecting the needs of his wife Donna and his two young children Ben and Samantha. Sure he wants to be with the wife and kids, sure he's well intentioned when it comes to a family get together, but let's face it, like many dads, he's more devoted to the job than anything else. Michaels other failing is one many readers can relate to. When it comes to working the remote control he's a technological dinosaur. His frustration with technology comes to a head late one night when he can't find the right remote control to turn on the TV set. It's a critical point in his life. A time when he wishes he had just one remote control that could control everything. Rewind back to that old saying be careful of what you wish for Michael, it may just come true. Michael Newman is about to get the universal remote control he wished for but there's a catch, as he is about to discover. "There was a joke between me and my girlfriend," screenwriter and producer Steve Koren recalls. "We got into a long argument, so I picked up the remote, pointed it at her and hit the 'mute' button. She didn’t find my little wish amusing, but I thought a lot of people could relate." From this incident Koren and his writing partner Mark O’Keefe came up with a simple idea; "What if you could actually control your life with the remote, what if you could raise the volume of the world or lower it." That idea would lead to the film, "Click". This simple idea opened the door to a lot of possibilities such as, "What if you could rewind your life and look back at your past? What if, instead of worrying about the future, you could fast forward and look at it? There were many different areas for the character to explore," Koren said. Koren recalled that it was easy sitting around with O'Keefe and coming up with jokes that related to a remote control but a screenplay would need more than just comedy. "The tougher part," Koren contends, "was the emotional journey. It’s not like most films where you start one day and you end a week later. You’re constantly jumping around. The movie starts in the present, then goes to the past, then leaps ahead thirty years into the future and then drops way back to when the character is a child. Writing wise it was very tough to construct." I bet by now there are many readers who are wishing there really was a remote control that could, like Michael Newman's, fast forward you through what we sometimes see as 'those dull and boring moments in our lives', but remember that warning! So, how did Adam Sandler get involved? Because Steve Koren and the comedian had worked together on many sketches for "Saturday Night Live". That brought onboard director Frank Coraci who went to college with producer Sandler and coincidently another of the films producers, Jack Giarraputo who has worked on many Sandler films including "The Longest Yard", "Mr Deeds" and "Billy Madison". How did the three become life long friends? "When did we first meet? Was it in the hallway? Coraci was the cool guy. He was great", Sandler recalls. "At NYU, he always frosted his hair, he had a mohawk. Girls loved him. He went to Danceteria a lot. He went to a lot of cool clubs. He was the Lord of the '80s. He brought me into punk. He listened to New Wave and punk." Coraci recalls meeting Sandler, "We met one night in college. We just knew each other, of each other, and we hung out and spent the whole night making each other laugh. I remember thinking ‘I'm in college, everybody's more mature.’ And then we met each other and we just made each other laugh. He did voices. I did voices. And then we just after that lived across the hall from each other every year. Producer Jack Giarraputo was my roommate. Tim Herlihy was his roommate. And Adam was also in a lot of my short films back in the day and we would go see him doing stand-up." Nothing has changed it seems when it comes to having fun together, as Coraci revealed. "During production, at the end of every day we’d kind of high five each other or regroup and say, ‘Boy this script is funny, but the stuff we came up with on the set today was even funnier,’" says Coraci. "It was so cool, because Adam is so good at that. He makes it all look so easy." And he never forgets his friends, all of whom he considers as part of his family! Like Steve Koren. "one of my friends called me up, my partner told me about this idea that Steve Koren had. Steve Koren, by the way, the guy who wrote it with Mark O'Keefe, I've known since I was twenty two. He was a page at Saturday Night Live. He would answer the phones and he'd give us phone messages he'd say, 'Oh yeah. I wrote a joke.' And he'd tell you the joke and you go, 'Hey. Steve Koren's pretty funny' and then all of a sudden he's wrote "Bruce Almighty" and this thing and he's a giant writer and he's just a great guy." Sandler showed great confidence in his friend when he decided to come on board. He remembers, "they told me about the premise of the movie and asked if I was interested in that and I didn't even read the script, I just said, 'Yeah. That's a huge idea, it sounds great.' That's how I decided to do this script, just off three sentences about what the movie's about, I knew it could be awesome." With such a tight knit group of firm friends working together on "Click" it raises the question, "how did Christopher Walken fit in?" According to Coraci even though "Oscar ® winner Christopher Walken was new to the group, he immediately fitted right in. When you see Adam and Christopher Walken side by side it’s pretty cool. Walken is a genius actor, but the pairing of him and Adam together is even more amazing. It’s rare you get to see two such great talents get together and do funny stuff like that." The hugely talented Walken produces a sparkling performance as Morty, a staff member at Michaels's 'Bed, Bath & Beyond' store. And don't be surprised when you see Walken singing and dancing in "Click", after all he did train to be a dancer at the Professional Children's School in Manhattan and contributed a mesmerizing dance performance to the Spike Jonze-directed music video for Fat Boy Slim’s "Weapon of Choice". When it comes to awards Walken has had his fare share, including a Best Supporting Actor Academy ® Award and New York Film Critic's Circle Award for the 1978 film "The Deer Hunter" and as recently as 2002 received the BAFTA and SAG awards for his role as Frank Abagnale Snr in Steven Spielberg's, "Catch Me If You Can". Kate Bekinsale takes a break from fighting Vampires and other evil entities to take on the role of Michael Newman's wife, Donna. Bekinsale, who is probably best remembered for her starring roles in "Van Helsing", and the hit vampire tales "Underworld" and "Underworld: Evolution", was described by Coraci as "the perfect actress" for "the perfect wife. She’s the kind of perfect woman than anybody would want to be married to, strong and beautiful with a good heart. I don’t know of anyone who’s not going to fall in love with her in this movie." One actor I was glad to see back in a major film was actor, producer, director and author of the Hank Zipzer: The World's Greatest Underachieve books Henry Winkler, recipient of France’s highest civilian honor, the 'Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres' (Knight of the Arts the Letter). Winkler is joined by another veteran, Julie Kavner. They play Michaels parents Ted and Trudy Newman. "They are the perfect blue-collar, sweet parents who get on your nerves because they love you so much. Henry and Julie did it so well. As soon as we put them together, we realized we couldn’t have come up with a better combination," Coraci says. "They both have the ultimate comedy chops. Henry, who worked with us before on "The Waterboy" completely understood our routine. And, Julie, what can I say? She got into the rhythm very quickly and when you have all these people that are comfortable with each other, things can get really funny." Also in the cast is the creator and star of "Baywatch" (or 'Babewatch' as it was affectionately called by many) David Hasselhoff, who plays Michael’s insensitive boss Mr Ammer. Hasselhoff got a big wrap from the director who says he has "so much energy you’d think there were seven of him instead of only one," adding "the guy is really funny. And when he arrived he just came in, put his total trust in us and had a great time." As for the kids, well they are a couple of gems. Tatum McCann and Joseph Castanon provided a bonus when it came to shooting "Click". "Don’t tell anyone," Coraci said, "but despite what they say about working with child actors, they were the easiest people to direct. They learned so fast and did everything I said exactly right." Being a big softy he also revealed, "They were the most loving kids. At the end of the day they would come up to me and say ‘Frank, we love you,’ and give me a big hug. It was perfect for the movie because it created a real sense of family." That in the end is the important lesson Michael Newman learns in "Click". It's all about family. And yes, about being careful when wishing. You may just get your wish, but at what expense? It's a lot of fun watching what happens in Michael's life thanks to the excellent visual effects supervised by Academy Award® winner Jim Rygiel and Pete Travers from Imageworks; the SFX which were supervised by John Hartigan, and the Special Makeup Effects from six times Academy ® Award winner Rick Baker ("How the Grinch Stole Christmas", "Men in Black", "The Nutty Professor", "Ed Wood", "Harry and the Hendersons" and "An American Werewolf in London"). The Verdict "Every time Christopher Walken appears on the screen, the laughter lifts, the movie lifts and so does Sandler. It's not the best work Sandler's done but "Click" does provide plenty of fun and enough value for your movie bucks to feel as though you haven't been shamelessly ripped off. Certainly worth a look at, especially if you're an Adam Sandler fan. Recommened. 3 STARS." Cast & Crew Bytes "CLICK" stars .......
Adam Sandler ["Punch-Drunk Love", "50 First Dates", "Spanglish" and "The Longest Yard"]; Kate Beckinsale ["The Golden Bowl", "Van Helsing", "The Aviator" and "Underworld: Evolution"]; David Hasselhoff ["Layover", "Fugitives Run" and "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story"]; Jennifer Coolidge ["Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde", "American Pie 3" and "Date Movie"], Henry Winkler ["Holes", "The Kid & I" and "The King of Central Park"] and Academy ® Award, Obie Award and Clarence Derwent Award winner Christopher Walken ["Catch Me If You Can", "Man on Fire", "The Stepford Wives" and "Wedding Crashers"] as Morty.
"CLICK" was .......
directed by Frank Coraci ["Murdered Innocence", "The Wedding Singer", "The Waterboy" and "Around the World in 80 Days"]; screenplay by Steve Koren ["A Night at the Roxbury" and "Bruce Almighty"] and Mark O'Keefe ["Bruce Almighty"]; production design by Perry Andelin Blake ["Mr Deeds", "The Longest Yard" and "The Benchwarmers"]; cinematography by Academy Award winner Dean Semler ["Dances With Wolves", "We Were Soldiers", "Bruce Almighty" and "The Longest Yard"]; original music by Rupert Gregson-Williams ["The Night We Called It A Day", "Hotel Rwanda" and "Over the Hedge"] set decoration by Gary Fettis ["The Lost World: Jurassic Park", "We Were Soldiers" and "Welcome to the Jungle"] and costume design by Ellen Lutter ["Friday the 13th Part 2", "Cop Land", "Big Daddy", "Mr Deeds", "50 First Dates" and "The Longest Yard"]. Run Time 109 minutes Rated M [AUST] Copyright ©2006 - Sony Pictures - All Rights Reserved Copyright Protected © 2006 - Impact Internet Services - All Rights Reserved