Let us celebrate Billy Madison and other Sandler-created classics of revolutionary cinema

Billy Madison, for example, is the tale of “the drunk layabout idiot son of a hotel magnate” whose position as heir to the family business is only jeopardized when he embarrasses his dad at an important dinner. The villain he’s up against is an executive set to take over the company who’s “finally undone by his total failure to produce one cogent thought on the topic of business ethics.”

In Happy Gilmore, Sandler gives us the tale of “a populist hero against a backdrop of obscene wealth and elitism” who wants to earn money playing professional golf only to save his poor grandmother’s house. Gilmore upends high society by hiring a homeless caddy (“an act of radical solidarity with the impoverished”) and ultimately triumphs over “the snobbish and vindictive Shooter McGavin.” One of the final scenes sees the evil McGavin “chased offscreen by an angry mob for stealing a championship jacket he hasn’t won—a perfect ‘eat the rich’ moment.”

Klee highlights other films, from Mr. Deeds to The Wedding Singer, that show Sandler’s movies as a collection thematically linked by their hatred for corporate greed and praise for the kind, blue-collar workers who humbly emerge victorious in the end of every story.

While he does point out that Sandler’s a registered Republican, there’s no denying that his work has a distinct, recurring message. And while much of the capitalist critique identified above is subtle, there’s certainly no denying that Billy Madison’s dueling shampoo and conditioner bottles introduced many young viewers to dialectics—a foundational concept to grasp on the road to Marxism.

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