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September 7, 2007 > Arts & Entertainment > Comedic attempt Balls of Fury hits, misses jokes

Comedic attempt Balls of Fury hits, misses jokes

By Evan Mintz | Thresher Editorial Staff

Balls of Fury is a loosely satirical take on Enter the Dragon, with pingpong replacing karate and Christopher Walken (Click) playing the villain. Let that sink in for a second. Roll it around on your palate. Really think about it. That sounds funny. It may not be original, but Balls of Fury should at least be funny.

Like the successful Blades of Glory, Talladega Nights or Dodgeball, the film treats a flippant pseudosport as a serious endeavor. Plus, it has Christopher Walken, a guaranteed show-stopper. And as one of the newer films in the recently popularized genre of the fake sports flick, one would expect that the writers have learned what works and what does not.

Really, Balls of Fury should be good. But it is not. The movie starts off strong but quickly fizzles out. The jokes, when they do arrive, generally fall limp. The ones that do not disappoint are often mishandled by the cast’s poor comedic senses. And there is barely any Christopher Walken.

Dan Fogler (School for Scoundrels), who plays once-shamed pingpong champ turned FBI agent Randy Daytona, has a background in theater, not comedy, and it shows. Acting as a poor man’s Jack Black, his chubby antics and unexplained obsession with Def Leppard only grow annoying as the film wears on. And it already feels too long at 90 minutes.

Even though he is down and out, Daytona is recruited for a secret mission by the FBI involving a pingpong tournament. Two decades have weakened Daytona’s skills, but he still hopes to take down his father’s killer, the pingpong-obsessed crimelord, Feng (Walken).

Daytona is trained by the stereotypical, Mr. Miyagi-esque, blind pingpong master, Master Wong (Shanghai Kiss’ James Hong). Here is a humorous wizened witticism Wong could have given the writers — blind jokes a comedy does not make. Unfortunately, the script is all eyes for bad blind lines.

Joining Wong in training Daytona is his attractive niece, Maggie Wong (Mission: Impossible III’s Maggie Q), who the filmmakers put in revealing attire as much as possible. She falls in love with Daytona for some reason.

But while Fogler and the rest of the crew get a regular chuckle, George Lopez (“George Lopez”) as FBI agent Rodriguez was a casting mistake that can only conjure up that dear “Family Guy” line: “‘The George Lopez Show’ only furthers the stereotype that George Lopez is funny.” His attempts at humor, or any acting at all, elicit more cringes than laughs. And be sure to walk out before his idiotic Scarface references in the film’s last 10 minutes, which Lopez must have forced into Balls of Fury via some sort of contractual obligation.

Eventually the film gets to the real star: Christopher Walken. But even he cannot save Balls. After all, Walken is best in a serious situation — see Pennies from Heaven — not as a pillar upon which a comedy lies. In fact, that role actually ends up falling upon the minor characters and various thugs throughout the seedy underbelly of criminal ping-pong tournaments.

In the end, it is not like the actors have absolutely no material to work with — for every joke that fails, there is one that works quite well. But the leading troupe of non-comedians has so much trouble making these jokes work that it is painful.

End of article

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