Philosopher Jean Paul Sartre once wrote, "Hell is other people." In Little Nicky, the title character may already be residing in Hell, but his brothers make things even worse for him. Although these three siblings are sons of the Devil, only Nicky wants to save his father from destruction and restore the balance between Good and Evil in the world. Farfetched as it seems, Little Nicky emerges as a comic tribute to filial loyality.

Adam Sandler (Big Daddy) and Harvey Keitel (U-571) succeed in playing the strangest roles of their careers in this outrageous film. Looking even more the underdog than in The Waterboy, Sandler gains immediate sympathy for Nicky by emphasizing his speech defect and facial deformity. And Keitel’s Satan oozes plenty of otherworldly decadence --- even while showing concern for his physically challenged son. When someone says a naughty word in front of Nicky, his father shouts, "I don’t like that language!" Still, he doesn’t hesitate when it’s necessary to send Nicky after his evil older brothers (Rhys Ifans and Tommy Lister Jr.) who have escaped to New York City.

"But I never even slept over at any dude’s house," complains Nicky upon receiving this dangerous assignment. Luckily, he meets up with Beefy, a talking bulldog (voiced by Robert Smigel), who serves as his wisecracking guide to life in the Big Apple. Beefy teaches the naïve Nicky important survival techniques. "It’s okay for me to go to the bathroom in public, but you can’t," he admonishes his student. After Nicky is run over by a train and a truck, Beefy also warns him not to stand in front of anything metal moving towards him.

Those are very funny scenes, but not everything about Little Nicky worked for me. As in most Sandler films (with the exception of The Wedding Singer), crude humor substitutes too often for creativity. Also, many situations are just plain silly instead of hilarious. Two sequences involving Hitler’s punishment in Hell are especially offensive here, and the running gag about breasts growing out of the Gatekeeper’s (Kevin Nealon) head is painfully unfunny.

Nevertheless, I did enjoy the many humorous cameos in Little Nicky. Veteran stand-up comic Rodney Dangerfield stands out as the Devil’s father. When Keitel’s character tells him "Everything is going to be okay," Dangerfield responds with "The last time you told me that, the Renaissance happened!" Director Quentin Tarantino (Pulp Fiction) gets a few laughs as a blind minister, and Reese Witherspoon (Election) is delightful as an Angel who helps Nicky. "God is so smart --- Jeopardy smart," she informs him. Patricia Arquette (Stigmata) shares some poignant moments with Sandler as Nicky’s love interest, a shy young woman who gives him "butterflies in the stomach."

Little Nicky’s costumes, set design, and special effects are first-rate also. Keitel looks almost romantic in his all-black Devil outfits. In one amazing scene, Sandler changes into hundreds of little spiders with his face as the body of each one. Fiery infernos, flying bats, and demons-in-a-bottle appear magically among the film’s over 300 effects shots. Hell, as depicted here, looks both gruesome and funny. Human dartboards, horny blackbirds and furniture constructed of damned souls fill this Satan’s palace. But where are the women? I didn’t see any here, so they must be in Heaven. After all, this is a fantasy.

(Released by New Line Cinema and rated "PG-13" for crude sexual humor, some drug content, language, and thematic material.)