Cinemavenger

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Uncut Gems

You make a movie about a degenerate gambler, New York jeweler, and Jew, and you call it Uncut Gems. How in the name of all things challah do you not work a foreskin joke in there somewhere?

Probably because you were too busy trying to get Adam "Manhandler" Sandler an Oscar instead of delivering an entertaining, engaging, thoughtful, or funny movie. But no, being rich and successful just ain't enough for the Sand-man. He won't rest until someone rubs his belly and coos to him, "Who's a good dramatic actor? You are! Yes, you are! Good boy." Guess he won't be getting any sleep anytime soon, because let's face it, Uncut Gems might as well be called Unpolished Turd.

Sandler's Howard Ratner could be the KKK's poster child for the scary, evil Jew. He's a wealthy, smarmy, scheming, self-important, self-loathing scumbag who thinks he has all the answers, and they all revolve around how to get just a bit more money into his pockets.

Howard has a wife and family on Long Island and a mistress who works for him in his jewelry shop and lives in his apartment in Manhattan. He thinks he's got his life-changing, big fish deal on the line when he buys some blood black opals from Ethiopia, but when they arrive, he immediately loans them to basketball star Kevin Garnett (playing himself). What the afikoman fuck?

Howard spends the rest of the movie trying to get his opals back and cash them in for a ticket to . . . paradise? Fat chance. He's the kind of guy that pawns unique jewelry his clients have given him to appraise for more money to make insane, parlay sports bets with. If someone handed him a million bucks, he'd have it in a bookie's hands in 10 minutes betting that Trump will hit a hole in one on the same day that Pete Rose finally gets into the Hall of Fame and the Lions win their first Super Bowl . . . in the middle of August.

If you're looking for two hours of non-stop yelling and screaming about absolutely nothing, though, Uncut Gems is your jam. Virtually every line of dialogue, from desperate pleas for mercy to tender "I love you" moments, are shouted like the characters are in a Most Stereotypical New Yawker contest.

June 12, 2020