The Netflix comedy-drama mines the star’s obsession with the game, as well as his experiences in the entertainment industry.

Adam Sandler, who’s a prolific movie producer, is at his best as an actor when playing a businessperson, as he does in “Hustle” (on Netflix), a breezy yet earnest basketball drama about the internal politics of the N.B.A. Because he’s neither an exceptional physical comedian nor a theatrically technical one but, rather, an extremely talented verbal one, Sandler is at his most interesting when his performances stick close to his own experience—or, at least, when they stand in a psychologically revealing relationship to it. That’s what he does in Judd Apatow’s “Funny People,” in the role of a famous comedian, and in the Safdie brothers’ “Uncut Gems,” in the role of a bling jeweller with a sports-gambling problem. In “Hustle”—which isn’t nearly as morally severe as “Funny People,” as freewheelingly tragic as “Uncut Gems,” or as aesthetically distinctive as either—Sandler gets to indulge the sport that he loves and fuse it with the garlicky, life-worn insiderness of his entertainment career.

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‘Hustle’ Trailer Invites Adam Sandler to Dribble Into Dramatic Territory Once Again

“Hustle” is in the genre of avocational cinema, in which the star combines his passion for basketball with his understanding that it’s also a business—and with his experience of the entertainment industry at large. Sandler didn’t write or direct it, but he dominates it. Though with little in the way of directorial originality, character development, or social perspective to recommend it, “Hustle” manages to turn a clattery plot and a treacly sentimentality into a refracted self-portrait, a work of personal cinema. The script, by Will Fetters and Taylor Materne, goes deep into the details of turning an athlete into a pro, both physically and mentally, and of the exacting labors of the sport’s executives to effect that transformation. It’s, essentially, a movie-business story, with Sandler playing a member of the production staff, whose contributions are crucial, misunderstood, and nearly anonymous, except to other insiders in the know. He’s waiting for his chance to move up, and, when he finds that he can’t, he takes an entrepreneurial, independent risk. Adam Sandler, producer and star, stars as a producer.

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