They should hand out high-grade blood pressure meds to people going to see this after it ends. The major strength and in a way the slight weakness of Uncut Gems is how laser-focused the Safdies are in conveying total anxiety, stress and mania through this extreme act of full cinema SOUND (levels of acting and over-lapping dialog, that Vangelis-Blade-Runner-on-Steroids/Crystal Meth score, some of the cinematography and the tracking of the camera).

I do wish there was a little more than just flourishes of relief, though I'd be lying if I said Sandler was anything but exceptional and riveting playing degenerate crumbling right before our eyes. While Eric Bogosian, Lakeith Stanfield and Kevin Garnett and many others here are natural solid, it's Sandler's show, and it's soulful and tense and harrowing and ultimately (as terrible as Howard can be) tragic. The filmmakers's greatest achievement from the looks of this and Good Time is finding star-actors who aren't known for their wide range and getting career-triumph work from them. If the movie isn't all that complex, I do think Howard is and that helps make this pretty special as a depiction of addiction, more than anything else. It's got grit and style to burn, which is mostly fine by me.

When "Uncut Gems" debuted on Netflix, the film caused a lot of buzz...particularly about Adam Sandler's performance in the lead. And, some were apparently upset that he did not receive an Oscar nomination for this. As for me, I think I can understand why he didn't. While it was a nice departure for Sandler, the film was so thoroughly unpleasant and awful experience I had a hard time even finishing the movie. It's simply hard to enjoy a film about folks as awful and despicable as the ones you see in the movie.

Howard is the owner of a jewelry store in New York and in many ways he's a stereotype of a Jewish jewelry guru. However, he's also a very flawed one...a man who is deeply in debt and possibly about to be killed because he owes bookies a fortune despite selling millions in jewelry. He hopes that a smuggled opal will somehow help him out of his predicament but he ends up losing it...and the men he owes are NOT happy!

Howard is a thoroughly despicable person who cheats on his wife, treats folks like garbage and he's a real sociopath. Because of this, I just wanted the bookies to shoot him and end the film....after about 15 minutes! Sure, the portrayal by Sandler is vivid...but the man and folks around him are so despicable that I really saw the film as more of an endurance contest than anything else. A thoroughly unpleasant film about thoroughly unpleasant people. If that's your thing, by all means watch it....but my time is too valuable to consider ever seeing it again.

It's 2012 New York City. Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler) is a greedy jeweler and a degenerate gambler. He is hounded by creditors especially those sent by his brother-in-law Arno (Eric Bogosian). He is married to Dinah (Idina Menzel) with kids. He also has his employee girlfriend set up in a love nest. Hustler Demany (Lakeith Stanfield) brings over NBA star Kevin Garnett to his store. Garnett is playing in the finals and is taken with Ratner's uncut stone. Events spiral out of control as Ratner's greed and gambling takes over.

Ratner is a really annoying character. There is simply no rooting interest. Without that, I don't care about what happens to him. It still could be great if he goes on an interesting adventure. That's the case for the most part in this movie. Sadly, it is entirely self-inflicted and that is also frustrating. Adam Sandler delivers a quality performance and he has one terrific monologue with Kevin Garnett. When the story is first laid out, I hoped for a series of hurdles to retrieve the stone. It would have been a fun scavenger hunt where hopefully he finds some redemption. That's not this movie. There is no redemption for this character. He is unrepentant and unable to grow. I also don't like this ending which is often a cheat in this type of movie. The darker way to end the movie would be to have him live with the consequences of his action. As a final note, the non-stop yelling cross-talk gets very annoying and tiresome. It's not surprising that I love his monologue more than anything.