Billy Madison (Adam Sandler) is the selfish obnoxious heir to a multi-million pound hotel chain that was set up by Billy's late mother and his father Brian Madison (Darren McGavin). Billy's father is set to retire soon and opts to leave one of his employees Eric Gordon (Bradley Whitford) in charge of his business upon his retirement. Billy objects to this believing that he should be placed in charge of his father's business. Brian doesn't believe that Billy is responsible enough or smart enough to run the business but agrees to give him full control of the business if he can pass grades 1-12 in 24 weeks. Eric wants the business for himself and will stop at nothing to ensure that Billy fails this challenge.Even if you're prepared to ignore the obvious flaws in the plot (a father handing his business over to his selfish and obnoxious son who has no business acumen and has had no prior involvement in running the company merely on the strength of him graduating from school. A teacher falling for a man-child re-running grades 1-12 who is even more immature than the kids who he attends school with) then the film still isn't very good. For the most part it relies on Sandler being in OTT mode and doing his utmost to make his character as irritating as possible. This is great from an 'acting' perspective, but ultimately makes him difficult to endure across the running time.The idea of Sandler graduating 12 years worth of school in a matter of weeks certainly isn't a bad one and perhaps would have worked better if more thought would have been put into the concept. I personally felt that it would have been funnier if the film would have shown more examples of Billy failing and struggling his way through school - I found it perplexing that Billy was portrayed as being rather simple-minded from the outset, but yet the film also represented him as a bit of a smart-ass at times which was puzzling. He seems to get through each school year far too easily and there also seemed to be a big continuity gap as well (at one point he seems to jump about 4 school years in one go!!!!) I also wasn't impressed by the fact that Sandler kept the majority of the focus on him (he has a whole host of children as supporting actors, but gives them absolutely nothing to do). It perhaps would have been better if he'd given a couple of the youngsters more defining roles so that he would have had people that he could have bounced off and built up something more in the way of a rapport with some of the youngsters. It seems rather arrogant and unfair for Sandler to give the rest of the cast so little to do (he clearly thought at this point in his career that he was strong enough to carry this sort of project on his own, but he simply can't and it really shows here).The film also substitutes intelligence and insight in favour of Sandler's overacting to the ninth in a performance that was more irritating than funny. He has a lisp in this film (like his character had in The Waterboy) but in Billy Madison it seems to come and go at will.Naturally with this type of plot there has to be a bad guy and the bad guy here is Eric who stops at nothing to prevent Billy from prevailing at the challenge that he's been set by his father and naturally sets about trying to scupper Billy's chances of succeeding. In this instance it is the head teacher that is used as a plot device as Eric digs some dirt on him (although the reveal here is imaginative it is utterly ludicrous and not even remotely believable). There are also things in here that feel a bit random - such as an impromptu sing-song which felt more at home in a musical and a final act that again was more stupid than funny.The only scene I actually liked was the 'peeing in the pants scene' and that was because that scene actually contained something in the way of pathos and actually had something to say (it's a pity there were not more examples of this in the rest of the film). I also thought Bradley Whitford put in a solid performance as Eric and most of the time I found him fun to watch. However, these are the only real positives I could find in this film.I'm not someone who is normally an 'Adam Sandler' hater (heck I'm one of the few people who defended the first 2 Grown Ups films), but Billy Madison is really lame and relies far too much on Sandler mugging and being OTT which unfortunately isn't enough to carry the film or make it worth watching.

Billy Madison is a typical Adam Sandler film, not the greatest plot but a barrel of laughs, if you like any other Sandler film i.e. Happy Gilmore, Little Nicky etc. then you will love this comedy. Billy Madison is the dim-witted son to the head of the Madison hotel chain, for years Billy had been told he will take over the company when his father retires, however after getting drunk & attempting to chase an imaginary penguin he embarrasses his father in front of all his associates at a dinner in the Madison household. Billy's father tells him that he will not be getting the company in preference of the evil Eric. Eric is mostly seen with Carl, another associate of Billy's dad whom he likes. Billy pitches an idea where he can go back to school, complete all grades in 2 week periods in order to win back the company.Billy Madison is a movie with a number of hilarious scenes. In one such scene, a third grader accidentally "pees his pants" and is afraid to get on the bus during a field trip. Sandler throws some water on his pants and tells the other children that "peein' in your pants is cool"! thus saving the child from embarrassment. In another scene, Billy calls ex-classmate Danny McGrath (Steve Buscemi) to apologize for picking on him as a kid. After the phone call, Danny crosses Billy off of his master list of "people to kill". Later, Danny comes to Billy's aid. Overall, this is a fun movie. If you like lighthearted comedy with just a touch of outrageous behavior, then you'll enjoy this breakout Adam Sandler hit.Overall rating: 7 out of 10.

This is one of those goofy, silly, awkward and stupidly funny flicks, starring Adam Sandler as Billy Madison, a rich but lazy son who makes a deal with his father that in order to inherit his hotel company, he must repeat Grades 1-12 in school in order to earn his education.Sandler seemed he doesn't care about good, careful and dramatic acting in this movie; he just wants to have fun and be silly, etching out slapstick comedy, gags and awkward moments whenever he can. It's probably a good movie for kids (minus the profanity) and teenagers, but adults might think the movie's pretty stupid and somewhat boring.The plot is somewhat fast-paced, but the overall acting and comedy, I though, were rather mediocre. This movie belongs on the list of films to watch only if you have absolutely nothing better to do or watch on TV.Grade D+

"Billy Madison" delivers a reasonable number of laughs despite massive and potentially crippling problems with the script, characters and plot. About 80% of the jokes and gags either fell flat or were cringe-worthy from my perspective; however, there were many jokes that worked for me and others may find mirth in some of the jokes I failed to appreciate. It was sufficiently frustrating that I had to pause the movie several times; however, it had enough goofy comedy that I resumed play. Among the many faults with the movie: It fails to deliver what Blake Snyder calls the promise of the premise. Billy doesn't actually complete twelve grades. He simply survives two weeks of classes at each grade level. Very little of his classroom experiences could be described as academic. It's very repetitive, so much so that many of the grades are simply skipped in the narrative. His blow-out graduation parties at his father's mansion also become repetitive. It might have been a stronger film if he had simply returned to complete twelfth grade or first grade. In line with this, we meet many characters who are involved briefly then disappear and there's little logic to why some characters who return at later stages. The antagonist, the self-serving CEO, never really increases the stakes. He's largely passive and reactive, except for hatching one plot that is quickly subverted. The romantic subplot is not believable, although this could be said for many comedies in the category Snyder labels fool triumphant. It's not really a fool triumphant movie, as Billy rarely offers a perspective of the world from the eyes of an innocent. Billy doesn't have a credible or meaningful character arc. Initially, his character is a totally unsympathetic self-indulgent incompetent sybarite. He has some insights into human character, but isn't the typical idiot savant, like Gump, Clouseau or English. He doesn't learn much of anything beyond rote memorization of historical dates. He never develops any reasoning or problem-solving skills. At the conclusion, Billy makes a surprise announcement that isn't much of a surprise. Many of the issues and subplots are resolved not through the actions of the protagonist, but through either the failings of other characters (such as the Jeopardy game) or a deus ex machina outcome (the come-uppance of a bully). The relationship between Billy and his father needs more work. Billy doesn't really need to complete twelve grades. His need is to win back his father's respect. His father is indulgent to a fault. But he has not been able to build a huge empire with sixty thousand employees without understanding people. His inability to understand either Billy or the CEO seems implausible. As McKee wrote. Comedy is king. The plots of the Marx Brothers' movies were simply threadbare excuses for a lot of their shtick. But people don't watch a Marx Brothers movie to see an intricate plot unfold. They want the goofball comedy. BM could have been a much better film and it's frustrating that, like Billy, it never rose to its full potential. But it managed to provide sporadic laughs. Technical aspects were more than adequate. The film also benefits from the participation of talented actors and comedians in supporting roles.