Movie review: ‘Just Go With It’

FloridaGator80
A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

At first on my blog, I tried to avoid reviewing movies that were too new or among the top films of the day. I’ve wanted to remind whoever manages to find my reviews to get something they might not have seen for a while and enjoy it again or make a discovery. However, I’ll took a somewhat current one with “Just Go With It” … especially since some folks have an inexplicable aversion to Adam Sandler’s comedy. If you’re critical of his work, give this one a shot … maybe Jennifer Aniston can make a difference. Or, you might actually uncover a wonderful comedy with solid acting from more than just the usual Sandler denizens. OK, I won’t mince words: Watch this one! It’s funny; it’s endearing; and you should love it – unless you don’t have a funny bone!

‘Just Go With It’
(2011; 117 minutes; rated PG-13; directed by Dennis Dugan and starring Adam Sandler, Jennifer Aniston and Nicole Kidman)

FAKING DIVORCE FOR THE SAKE OF LOVE (AND LAUGHS)

(NOTE: I expanded this review with additional opinion, some more trivia and updated some links on July 9, 2017. I again expanded it on June 8, 2020. I again expanded it on March 24, 2024. I again expanded it on May 27, 2026.)

I’m glad that comic actor Adam Sandler and director Dennis Dugan work well together. Otherwise you wouldn’t have “Happy Gilmore” (click here to readd my review) or “I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry” (click here to read my review). Both are fall-down funny. So, when we come to “Just Go With It,” the team keeps the hits coming. I’m looking at “Just Go With It” today because it is funny, well-acted (yes, I wrote “well-acted”) and deserves your attention.

Of course, the word puerile comes to mind when you think about Sandler’s comedy since it means “childishly silly and trivial” and that kind of comedy has turned off many. In Sandler’s case, it also turns off the critics but not the ticket sales. Done well, puerile humor in film becomes an artillery shell of fun that drops somewhat out of nowhere.

A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

None of Sandler’s films fits this description any better than “Just Go With It.”

In “Just Go With It” Sandler plays “Dr. Daniel ‘Danny’ Maccabee,” who is a womanizing plastic surgeon in Los Angeles. He has a shallow love life because of being jilted by his first fiancée but now he’s found a young woman who he’s falling for. However, she’s spotted a wedding ring on his finger (he’s kept it as a way to pick up women since he didn’t marry the fiancée) and needs to make sure he’s really going to divorce his current “wife.”

A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

Enter Jennifer Aniston as “Katherine Murphy,” who is his medical assistant and is also a single mother who has seen Sandler operate (in more ways than one) for years. She and her two kids get wrapped up in a very tangled web of lies to help Sandler get married. Then the fun REALLY begins.

The whole group (Sandler, Aniston, his new girlfriend, Aniston’s kids and Sandler’s cousin posing as Aniston’s lover) wind up on a trip to Hawaii as a way to for them all to bond. At the Hawaiian resort Aniston runs into a hated former sorority sister and then has to spin an additional web of lies to cover up her real life.

Whew! And you thought the lives of the rich and famous is all fun and games.

About the top of the cast …

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    A three-time Golden Globe nominee (not for this one), Sandler is, of course, Sandler in this one. You know what you’re going to get with his wisecracks and puerile humor (there’s that word again), but as in so many other films he pulls it off with panache and leaves you on the floor. You won’t find an Oscar at his house (he’s never been nominated), but he was nominated for a Globe for “Punch Drunk Love” and his other nominations were for the tee-vee special “Adam Sandler: Love You” and the movie “Jay Kelly.” He’s also been in “Grown Ups” and its sequel as well as “50 First Dates.” Sandler is also a seven-time Primetime Emmy nominee, with four earned for writing and one as a guest host for “Saturday Night Live.”

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    A Golden Globe winner for TV’s “Friends” plus four nominations (not for this one), Aniston does a great job here balancing being herself as an honest, decent mother who has to become a supreme bitch in front of Sandler’s love interest. She can take catty to a new level, but also knows how to get real. Aniston is a very under-appreciated actor. She’s also been in “Horrible Bosses” (click here to read my review), the cult classic “Office Space” (click here to read my review) and “We’re the Millers” (which is even more fall-down funny than “Just Go With It”). In addition to “Friends,” Aniston was nominated for two Globes for her work on the tee-vee series “The Morning Show” and the movie “Cake.” She won one and was nominated for nine Primetime Emmy awards with her win for “Friends” and three nominations for “The Morning Show.”

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    I was particularly impressed with the work of Oscar winner and four-time nominee as well as five-time winner and 12-time nominee for Golden Globes (not for this one) Nicole Kidman. She plays “Devlin Adams,” who is the college nemesis of Aniston, and is so hated that Aniston named a bodily function after her (Aniston’s kids, for example, “take a Devlin”). Kidman is simply marvelous here in what is a small role for such a headliner and plays especially well off the work of musician Dave Matthews, who plays her husband “Ian Maxtone Jones” (I’ll get to him later). I’m not a big Kidman fan, but she really rang up style points with me with this character and especially her one-one-one scene with Aniston at the end of the film. She won her Oscar for “The Hours.” She’s also been in “Betwitched” and with former hubby Tom Cruise in both the über-steamy “Eyes Wide Shut” and the NASCAR flick “Days of Thunder” (click here to read my review).

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    Matthews, who is the front man for the once hyper-popular “Dave Matthews Band,” does another good turn here in a Sandler film (he was also in “I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry”) and has the single funniest moment in the film when, during a dance contest, picks up a coconut with his butt cheeks. Good job, Dave. He has also been in “Because of Winn-Dixie” and an episode of TV’s “House M.D.”

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    Brooklyn Decker plays the stunningly beautiful “Palmer Dodge,” who is the target of Sandler’s affection. However, Decker doesn’t bring as much acting ability to the table as she does physical presence and that means she falls basically to the stereotype of being window dressing and having gotten the part because of how she fills out a bikini – although Aniston certainly gives her a run for a money in this category. Decker’s also been in “Battleship” and has a string of TV roles on her somewhat brief resume of 19 credits since 2007. “Just Go With It” was her first film after four TV credits. Sadly, she’s been nominated for “Razzies” as “worst” for both “Battleship” and “Just Go With It.” I understand the criticisms about “Battleship,” but she was OK and not a failure in my mind with “Just Go With It.”

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    Rounding out the top of the supporting cast is Nick Swardson, who has impeccable comedy credentials and plays Sandler’s cousin “Eddie Simms.” Swardson tags along on the trip as “Dolph Lundgren” (Sandler used the name on Decker in one of his lies, so they had to come up with a “Dolph”) and is marvelous with his physical comedy. Swardson, who was also in “I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry” and other Sandler films, has been in “Grandma’s Boy” (which is a killer funny stoner flick – click here to read my review) and “The House Bunny.”

The two young actors who play Aniston’s children (Bailee Madison as “Maggie Murphy”/“Kiki Dee Maccabee” and Griffin Gluck as “Michael Murphy”/“Bart Maccabee”) hold their own with the adults – and that’s not easy to do here.

  • A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

    Madison, who affected an English accent during much of “Just Go With It,” has worked with some top stars, including noted work on “Brothers” and already had 39 acting credits at the age of 14 at the time of the posting of my original review in 2014. She had 60 acting credits split between the big- and small-screens as of the 2026 update of this review.

  • Gluck was in “A Boy’s Life” and notched 40 acting credits since his first in 2003. Like Madison, Gluck has split time between tee-vee and movies and has been on such varied programs as TV’s “The Office” and the flick “Dinner in America.”
A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

“Just Go With It‘s” best scene among a bunch of ’em is the short one where Aniston and Kidman get real with each other at the end and tell the complete truth about their lives. It’s really good work by both actors and this one scene elevates Kidman in my eyes. While the entire film is funny, this one scene makes it all worthwhile.

The film’s funniest strung-together scenes are at the beginning when Sandler sees patients who have problems such as an eyebrow that’s three inches higher than it should be and a woman whose breast implant has ruptured. Sandler gives a serious tweak to your funny bone with these patients.

A promotional photo from the movie “Just Go With It.”

As for Sandler and his movies: Some insiders say Sandler films on location to make his filmmaking more fun and, despite criticism of his films as vacuous, that’s why many stars want to work on his films. I hope that’s true, since the actors deserve such a working environment. I like it because his movies are, for the most part, funny and enjoyable. So, there you go to the critics!

So, all in all, “Just Go With It” a film you should consider first because it will make you laugh without insulting your intelligence and second if you didn’t see it before. If you have seen it, make sure to revisit without delay. You obviously need the laughs.

“Just Go With It” was the 27th ranked film at the U.S. box office in 2011 with $103 million in ticket sales, according to Box Office Mojo. On a budget of $60 million it has brought in $214.9 million worldwide and another $14.5 million in DVD sales, according to Wiki. Love him or hate him, you’ve gotta give Sandler credit for making money with his movies. The No. 1 film that year was “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” with $381 million in the U.S. alone. The other films from 2011 that I’ve reviewed are:

Assorted cast and notes (via IMDb.com):

  • Sandler’s middle name is Richard and his nickname is “Sandman;” Aniston’s middle name is Joanna; and Decker’s middle name is Danielle.
  • As to the height of each of the three female actors: Aniston is 5-foot-4¼; Decker is 5-foot-9; and Kidman is tallest at 5-foot-11. As for Sandler, he’s 5-foot-9¾.
  • Noted sportscaster Dan Patrick plays “Tanner Patrick,” who is the emcee of the hilarious dance contest between Aniston and Sandler and Kidman and Matthews. Patrick has also been in “BASEketball” and also with Sandler in “The Waterboy.”
  • Directly from IMDb.com: “Despite the negative critical reception of the film, Nicole Kidman said that she enjoyed being part of the project, mainly because she got to work in her native Hawaii, and because her parents from Australia were able to spend time with her and her children, while she was working.”
  • Pro tennis star Andy Roddick is here as “Good Looking Guy on Plane.” He’s also been host on TV’s “Saturday Night Live.” “Just Go With It” is his only film role. Oh, BTW … he’s been married to Decker since 2009 and the couple has two children.
  • “Just Go With It” was released on Feb. 11, which is Aniston’s birthday.
  • Finally and directly from IMDb.com: “Dave Matthews‘ character name (Ian Maxtone Jones) is a friendly nod to Ian Maxtone-Graham, The Simpsons (1989) writer/producer who co-wrote the first version of The Hanukkah Song with Adam Sandler.”

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