Not-so-bosom buddies

Brooklyn firefighter Chuck (Kevin James) has a big problem: After spending too long mourning the death of his wife and the mother of their two children, he’s passed the time limit allowed to fix the paperwork concerning who gets what if he were to die one day on the job. Rather than plunge into the bureaucracy machine and sort it out legally, on a seeming whim he persuades his co-worker and best pal Larry (Adam Sandler) to join him in a scheme to defraud the city by taking advantage of the gay-friendly domestic partners pension plan.

Let’s get hitched, he cries. And they do.

Of course, no one believes that these two prime examples of studly heterosexuality are actually plumbing each other, so an investigator is set on the case and a hottie attorney (Jessica Biel) is assigned to counter the argument … and place temptation before the incorrigible male slut Chuck and impel him to break character.

And the usual comedy template is trotted out: Men behaving offensively, followed by the final act showing them realizing how badly they’ve been acting and straightening out. So to speak.

It’s pretty much another round of leaving the offensensitivity meter at the door.

I’ve never been a big fan of Adam Sandler, but this is the most amusing thing I’ve seen him in. Not saying much there, but I’m sure having Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor (Sideways) bring in the script helped a lot.

That is by no means saying that it’s a good movie, because it’s pretty much a mess—one minute it’s a dramedy, the next a farce. Even the setup of the why the two needed to get hitched seems like “whatevah.”

All in all, a complete shambles, but still funny. Not as in quotable funny or even memorable funny … just sporadically amusing. And Biel gets down to her scanties.

Actually, there’s a lot of that kind of action on display here … as if to reassure the dudes that they won’t catch Teh Gay from watching this flick.