Are those pit stains on Will Ferrell's shtick?
After four jock-themed comedies in three years, Semi-Pro -- his latest reiteration of growth-stunted masculinity -- can't help but make you feel it's time he benched the routine.
To be fair, this basketball farce offers a few chuckles and could very well appease much of his fan-base (it's funnier than 2005's Kicking and Screaming) but it falls short of the high-spinning comic pirouettes of last year's Blades of Glory. And frankly, after the promise and depth Ferrell -- fresh off Old School and Elf -- demonstrated in the dramatically sound Melinda and Melinda and undervalued Stranger Than Fiction, Semi-Pro feels more like a creative retreat than a welcome encore. To his credit, and unlike many of his peers, Ferrell has shown reluctance to churn out needless sequels (he gratefully torpedoed plans for a cash-grab Elf 2), but just because there's not a roman numeral after the title doesn't necessarily mean it's not a retread, thematically or tonally.
In Semi-Pro, Ferrell stars as Jackie Moon, a one-hit wonder in the 1970s (the opening credits ditty, Love Me Sexy) who used his minimal fortune to buy the Tropics, a semi-professional Flint, Mich., basketball team.
Moon, as calamitous as many of the other dolts Ferrell has mythologized over the years, is not only the owner, but the coach, a player and the team's shameless self-promoter.
When his league -- the now-defunct American Basketball Association -- announces it's going to roll four teams into the NBA and dissolve the stragglers, Moon charts a course to the big leagues by 1) winning games and 2) attracting crowds. From here, the story divides into two not-entirely-compatible halves.
The first takes the shape of a generic underdog story with Woody Harrelson joining the motley crew as a former pro loathed by his teammates (particularly Andre Benjamin, aka Andre 3000). The second consists of the stunts and schemes Moon performs and plots in the hopes of ratcheting up attendance. This includes, as featured predominantly in the ads, strapping on roller-skates and jumping bikini-clad cheerleaders -- as well as wrestling a bear.
But that's about all the action he gets.
Oddly, considering Ferrell is the superstar here, it's Harrelson who receives what little character development the semi-script offers as well as a romance with a former flame (Maura Tierney). Can the white man still jump?
Ferrell, conversely, has the flashier but shallower role of class (or, in this case, court) clown -- off-setting the Rocky-esque rise of the Tropics with scattershot silliness.
Throughout, the gags dribble along -- some successful, others less so.
Notable supporting players include Will Arnett, Andrew Daly, Rob Corddry, Andy Richter and most enjoyably, Jackie Earle Haley as a stoner who seems to have wandered in from the set of a better film.
(This film is rated 14-A)
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