It’d be easy for me and cathartic for us all to curate a collection of the most scathing, hateful responses to Adam Sandler’s new movie, Jack & Jill, which you knew were coming from the moment we all saw the first trailer. Trust me, they didn’t disappoint. The actual NY Post headline for their review is “Adam & Heave.”

But what’s even more interesting to me are the moments where the critics are desperately trying to think of something good to say, solely in the interests of fairness, and yet their true, incandescent hatred still bleeds through, like the best passive-aggressive exchange with your boss.  That’s how the Plot Recreated with Reviews game was born, where I use faux-expository quotes from critics’ reviews to recreate the plot of a movie they all despised. It’s fun! But before I start, perhaps my favorite passive-aggressive-y quote:

Also amusing are the film’s opening and ending credit sequences, which collect a wide variety of real-life twins to talk about their relationship, and to tease each other the way only siblings can.
Unfortunately, in between those scenes — and apart from Pacino’s lip-smacking performance — you’re still left with an Adam Sandler movie, with all that entails.

Take out the expository details, and you’ve got “the credits were nice.” I love that. Anyway, let’s get to the game:

In “Jack and Jill,” as in “Grown Ups” (both directed by Dennis Dugan), Sandler plays a guy with a more or less perfect life — cute kids, cool job, big house, hot wife — who is grievously annoyed by people variously defined as losers. This expansive category includes anyone who can be mocked for reasons of hygiene, physical appearance or ethnic background, though at the last minute, just to prove what a nice guy he is, Mr. Sandler will substitute condescension for contempt. (AO Scott, NY Times)

Oh dammit, AO Scott, you always ruin this game. Let’s start over.

Sandler plays Los Angeles ad man, who has a sister who still lives in the Bronx. She comes to visit for Thanksgiving, and drives him crazy. (Newark Star Ledger)

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"Five. Five Dollar. Five dollar foot loooong...."

Everything was coming up Dolphin at the box office this weekend, with Morgan Freeman and Marine Biologist Harry Connick Jr. leading all comers with $14.2 million. But in terms of new releases, 50/50 led with $8.86 million, barely $50 grand ahead of Courageous (which could change when final numbers are released this afternoon). Now, if you’re anything like me, you probably just thought, “Courageous? What the hell is Courageous?” The answer is that it’s a Jesus movie from Sherwood Pictures, the same company behind Kirk Cameron’s Fireproof. And it made its $8 million in half as many theaters as 50/50.

Keep in mind, I hadn’t heard of this movie before today, and I write a movie blog. The fourth film from Sherwood (whose films, Flywheel, Facing Giants, Fireproof, and now Courageous) have all been written and directed by pastor Alex Kendrick, Courageous had a budget of $1 million, their biggest to date. In the hopes of familiarizing you with it, so you don’t one day pick it up by accident at the movie store and burn your heathen skin on the box, I thought we’d play the plot recreated with reviews game. But remember: celebrate, don’t ridicule. Persecution is what powers them, like that nuclear dude in Superman 4 with the sun.

The film’s co-writer and director, Alex Kendrick, stars as Adam Mitchell, a police officer struggling to uphold his professional duties while providing spiritual guidance to his family. -NY Times

It follows four Albany, Georgia (the home of Sherwood Baptist) sheriff’s deputies, Adam (Alex Kendrick), Nathan (Ken Bevel), Shane (Kevin Downes) and David (Ben Davies) – -Orlando Sentinel

— (three Anglo, one African-American) — -Christianity Today

and one Hispanic laborer… -Village

…who are tested by the small city’s gang and drug problems, something the sheriff identifies, through statistics, as being the product of kids growing up in fatherless homes. -Orlando Sentinel

Adam frets over the father he wants to be to his young daughter and aspiring track star teenage son. Nathan is trying to keep his 15 year-old daughter beyond the reach of “saggy pants”  — older teens who are nothing but trouble to girls that age. -Orlando Sentinel

The deputies are close enough friends to talk about their personal lives, with Adam and Nathan pointing to God and the Bible as their guideposts. -Orlando Sentinel

Shane and David have different backgrounds and just listen, patiently, to their proselytizing colleagues... -Orlando Sentinel

…who renew their commitment to Christ and their children when one of them, Adam, loses his daughter in a car accident shortly after refusing to playfully dance with her. -VillageVoice

He fondly watches his daughter dancing in the grass, but self-consciously turns down her request that he dance with her, telling her he’ll dance with her in his heart. -Christianity Today

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(The poster, if it were honest)

It’s been a while since we played this game, so here’s a refresher. The way it works is, we take a movie none of us are probably going to see (say, a Miley Cyrus tear jerker, a J. Lo rom-com, or in this case, a high-larious laffer about Carrie Bradshaw juggling family and career), and try to recreate the plot using quotes from the sad-sack critics forced to sit through it. Because great art comes from limitations, we restrict ourselves to only expository quotes (NO ANALYSIS!). But of course, the thinly-veiled hatred still seeps through, and therein lies the fun. Today’s subject is I Don’t Know How She Does It, starring Sarah Jessica Parker, Greg Kinnear, and Christina Hendricks, based on Allison Pearson’s clit-lit bestseller of the same name. You might be shocked to learn that an SJP vehicle with a condescending title and a script that looks like it was written in 1978 was not a critical darling. Oh I know, I was as shocked as you are, she’s such a hit with the commoners.

Sarah Jessica Parker plays Kate, a harried Boston banker who spends the entire movie warming up leftover working-mom gags. -NYPos

She’s usually a mess: shirt partially untucked, hair uncombed, a splotch of that morning’s breakfast lodged in a crusty clump on her blazer. -AP

Her job as an investment banker has her traveling frequently. -Film.com

We first see Kate, who’s Type-Triple-A, as she desperately repackages a store-bought pie for a bake sale to make it seem homemade. -Chicago Tribune

She narrates the film for us, Carrie Bradshaw-style, letting us know how much she misses her 6-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son when she’s away. -Film.com

“This pie was going to be home-made if it’s the last thing I did,” vows Kate as she hastens to the bake-sale. -Guardian

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As you’ll see later today, I often write film reviews.  But since my site isn’t all film reviews, I have the freedom not to review every film, such as the ones I can tell ahead of time aren’t my cup of tea, and will serve only throw off the curve when I’m trying to form an opinion about something I actually care about later.  Have you ever read an aging critic who’s had to suffer through every Larry the Cable Guy armpit fart and Katherine Heigl queef balloon (or their earlier equivalents) for the last 30 years?  Even the good ones eventually go crazy, just look at Peter Travers.  Last I heard, the man was trying to hail a cab with his own feces.  In any case, this idea eventually gave birth to this game we play, where we take a movie most of us will never have to see, and try to recreate the entire plot using only expository quotes from the poor-bastard critics forced by hateful editors to suffer through it.  We try to use only their faux-neutral summary sections, but the beauty of it is, their utter disdain often still manages to shine through.

Today’s victim is Something Borrowed, starring Kate Hudson.  If you’ve ever seen a movie before, you should know the entire plot of a movie called Something Borrowed starring Kate Hudson ahead of time, but these poors sons of bitches went anyway.  Here’s a cross section of their screams as Kate Hudson spike heeled their testicles (or ovaries).

Ginnifer Goodwin stars as Rachel, a lonely, insecure flibbertigibbet with a knack for getting herself into embarrassing situations. Kate Hudson plays Darcy, her best friend since childhood, but the two have grown into very different people: Goodwin a shy, steady, humble professional and Hudson a bubbly, narcissistic party girl. -AV Club

Darcy and Rachel, both lawyers, live in New York — a place, as rendered by the director, Luke Greenfield, from which anyone seeking diversity and glamour would surely flee for Omaha. -NY Times

(At one point we do see an extra on a park bench engrossed in “Something Blue,” by Emily Giffin, who also wrote the best-selling novel on which “Something Borrowed” is based.) -NY Times

“Something Borrowed” introduces us to Rachel, on the night of her 30th birthday. She’s quietly freaking out about the passage of time because she’s still hopelessly single, the clichéd trademark of so many chick-lit heroines. Meanwhile, her closest pal is about to marry Dex (Colin Egglesfield), Rachel’s good friend from law school. -AP

…a hot rich guy as passive as he is handsome. -EntertainmentWeekly

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Ben Stiller and Robert Deniro’s embarrassing paycheck movie, Little Fockers opens this weekend. I took one look at the trailer and saw that filmmakers thought the fact that “Focker” kind of sounds like “F*cker” was a strong enough joke that they re-used it five times in two minutes and figured it’d be okay for me to sit this one out.  Many of my film critic colleagues, however, aren’t content with simply assuming that hitting one’s penis with a framing hammer will be painful, and had to find out the boner way. I mean hard.  But thanks to those heroes, we can now play the Plot Recreated with Reviews game.

You know how this works: we recreate the plot using only expository quotes — NO ANALYSIS! — from the poor sad bastards who had to sit through it.

ACT I

Nothing much has changed in the household of Gaylord Focker except that everyone is a few years older. [StarTribune]

Jack, who now suffers from serious heart palpitations, is obsessed with finding a successor to his “throne.”  [WashingtonPost]

“Are you ready to be the GodFocker?” he demands. [StarTribune]

Jack decides Greg is having an affair with pharmaceutical rep Andi Garcia… [FilmSchoolRejects]

…[with whom] Greg is working closely peddle Sustengo, an erectile dysfunction pill… [WashingtonPost]

… and who we’re supposed to believe becomes instantly smitten with Stiller after helping him give an anal probe to an elderly patient. [JoBlo]

She shows up at male nurse Focker’s hospital, inexplicably signs him up to give speeches on her erectile-dysfunction drug, then strips down to her undies and jumps him. [NYPost]

Bernie Focker (Dustin Hoffman), struck with a bout of “manopause,” has fled to Spain to study flamenco dancing, while Dina Byrnes (Blythe Danner) is experimenting with kinky role play in hopes of spicing up her and Jack’s sex life. Greg has to impress the headmaster of a snooty private school (Laura Dern) where he wants his children to go. [WashingtonPost]

Owen Wilson hangs around again as the golden best friend to flirt with Greg’s wife again (accidentally, he got a giant back tattoo of her). [NYPost]