You Don’t Mess with the Zohan is a comedy about an Israeli hero named Zohan Dvir (played by Adam Sandler) who fakes his own death in order to achieve his own dream of becoming a hairstylist in New York.
SPOILER WARNING: Plot and/or ending details follow.
Adam Sandler in "You Don’t Mess with the Zohan"
Zohan Dvir is a Mossad agent that every Palestinians hate. While on vacation at Bat Yam beach, Zohan’s Hacky Sack prowess has attracted several women and capturing the attention of every beach-goer. He cooks fish in the nude using plentiful amount of hummus. As he finishes cooking, an Israeli Defense Forces helicopter arrives, taking him away from his well-earned vacation.
Zohan agrees to do another mission of recapturing a key Palestinian terrorist, the “Phantom” (John Turturro). When Zohan tells his parents about his desire to start a new life, his parents assume he would become an electronic store manager as every Israelis would. But when Zohan says he wants to become a hairstylist in New York City, his parents just laugh it off.
The dissatisfied Zohan fakes his own death during the pursuit of the Phantom, who is deceived into believing he had killed Zohan. Zohan smuggles himself into a flight to New York City in a pet crate of two dogs named Scrappy and Coco. Changing his hairstyle into a 1980s Paul Mitchell’s Avalon style, he lands his feet on New York City with a new alias, “Scrappy Coco”.
Initially, Zohan is unsuccessful at getting a job as a hairstylist in numerous salons. However, Zohan earns himself a place to stay when he saves Michael in the street.
As his fellow Israeli friend, Uri (Ido Mosseri) has recommended, Zohan attempts to land a job in a salon owns by a Palestinian woman named Dhalia (Emmanuelle Chriqui). In the beginning, Zohan only gets to sweep the floors for free. However, when Zohan manages to please a senior lady with a satisfying haircut and sex, Dhalia gives Zohan the freedom to roam freely. Zohan’s reputation becomes an instant hit, even Paul Mitchell personally invites Zohan to work for him but Zohan has rejected.
Eventually Zohan is recognized by a Palestinian cab driver called Salim (Rob Schneider), whose goat Zohan had stolen after Salim threw his shoe at Zohan and spit in his face. Salim tries to convince his friends to help him exact revenge on Zohan. They decide to build a handmade bomb, but they are unsure how to do so. Thinking that they need “chemicals,” Salim and his friends walk into a pharmacy and try to ask for liquid nitroglycerin, however, due to Salim’s mispronunciation, the pharmacist instead sells Salim with Neosporin. Finding that the Neosporin doesn’t destroy Zohan’s workplace, Salim reluctantly informs Phantom through a Hezbollah hotline. Phantom pays a visit to New York to hunt Zohan down after Salim threatens to reveal Phantom’s killing of Zohan is fake.
Zohan realizes that he has fallen in love with Dhalia when he discovers that he has unexplainable erectile dysfunction except during her presence. However, Dhalia rejects Zohan’s feelings for her after she finds out that he was formerly an Israeli counter-terrorist operative. Zohan decides to leave Dhalia and confront the Phantom. His fight is cut short with sudden news of the Middle Eastern block being attacked by white arsonists dressed in Arabic clothing. The arsonists are actually hired by Walbridge (Michael Buffer) to instigate an inter-ethnic riot between the Israelis and Palestinians so that he can take over their stores with less hassle.
When Zohan and Phantom work together to save the block, Dhalia shows up and reveals herself as the Phantom’s sister – or “Fattoush” as she calls him. Zohan’s personal dossier allows him to discover the arsonists’ true identities as rednecks hired by Walbridge. Zohan and Phantom lead the united Israelis and Palestinians of the block to save their shops, defeating the rednecks, thwarting Walbridge’s plans. The police arrive to arrest Walbridge for his crimes.
With the Israelis and the Palestinians united, the block is transformed into a mall, in which Zohan and Dhalia realize their dream, opening a joint beauty parlor. The Phantom also achieves his lifelong passion of opening up a shoe store. The movie ends happily as Zohan’s parents give him a surprise visit and approve of his new wife (Dhalia) and their hair salon, called “Dalohan”.
Overall, You Don’t Mess with the Zohan is a humorous movie with mostly lame jokes and involvement of many lewd situations.
My ratings: 6 out of 10.
Popularity: 1%
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3 comments ↓
I read the review of this movie in other blogs. Mostly the readers have bad opinion about this movie. I haven’t seen it myself. But, I thought Adam Sandler movie are mostly good.
The movie is horrible! a lot of stereotypes and racial remarks, I usually like his movies but this one I COULD NOT WATCH till the end!
HORRIBLE!!
I Thought it was one of the best/funniest movies I had ever seen
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