You’ll need to take your testosterone pills for this one. The longest yard, starring Adam Sandler as expired football star Paul Crewe , along with a cast of loveable convicts led by Chris Rock, Bert Reynolds (of the original Longest Yard) and various stars of the WWE wrestling world including Goldberg as the convict with the oversized member.

The movie begins with a few chuckle-worthy scenes, which quickly became a distant memory as Crewe goes on a slapstick-style, drunken joy ride that results in a multi-police car pile up (luckily the police were chasing Crewe from four different directions, making for a better pile up).

From there, because of a previous felony, Crewe is sent to prison where the warden (James Cromwell) wants him to coach his guards in the prison guard football league. But the guards want no part of being coached by a convict so they try to dissuade him from taking the job by beating him mercilessly (although, thankfully, he manages to avoid any injury beyond a few bruises).

Eventually, though, the warden forces Crewe to take the job and so Crewe’s first suggestion is that the guards have a tune up game before the prison guard league starts. This sparks the warden’s evil idea for a guard-prisoner match and the premise is set.

The story from there is a fairly standard underdog story, but it manages not to live up to even this basic plotline as it denigrates into humor that is borderline sexist and heterosexist, which wouldn’t be so bad if the writers were at least a little bit clever about it. But, instead, the evil prison guard who has his steroids switched for estrogen pills just becomes a crescendo of boring female stereotypes.

The football itself is based only loosely on how the real game is played, and instead is more reminiscent of a staged wrestling match—which actually makes the several WWE wrestlers in attendance come in handy. But, oddly enough, even though the referees are ridiculed for being biased in favour of the prison guards, they never call the prisoners’ for their high-flying drop kicks.

When the movie comes to its thankful conclusion, it seems, from the sentimental music, that we are actually supposed to be touched as the characters hug it up. I guess I needed to take more testosterone pills to appreciate the moment.

Review by Geckles