The concept of people throwing balls at each other is inherently funny and really helps this film along. This takes a while to get into its stride - the old film with Hank Azaria about the history of Dodgeball feels like a slightly clunky bit from The Simpsons, and the "we need$10,000 in three days" a bit too Syd Field (as indeed the whole structure is).
But things are cliches for a reason - it works, and once the story gets going it develops its own mad momentum. You'd normally imagine Vince Vaughan as the baddie and Ben Stiller as the goodie but it works the other way round - Vaughan in particular has an engaging off-key quality that brings freshness. And even Christine Taylor may be Ben Stiller's partner in real life but she's very effective in these sort of roles (the straight love interest - they're not as easy to play as you might think).
Sometimes the random tangents don't quite pull off(eg the pirate man) but more often than not they do (eg cameos from the Hoff and Chuck Norris). And the climactic battle is actually quite exciting.
No comments:
Post a Comment