Rim shot

Semi-Pro ended up being the first movie I saw over spring break (there will be more reviews forthcoming) and unfortunately it did not begin on a positive note. Will Ferrell has been pretty consistent when it comes to funny movies (we'll just pretend that 2005, in which he made Kicking and Screaming and Bewitched, never existed). His track record gets marred here, though, as this is one of his lesser efforts.

It would be easy to simply criticize this film as being a carbon copy of his past successes. It is true that there are scenes in this film that feel like retread (i.e. we've seen Ferrell get attacked by several animals in films; this time it's a bear). However, I'm not going to complain so much about that, because I'm of the belief that what's funny once typically remains funny. You don't want everything to be the same, but reusing certain proven jokes is not the worse thing that you can do.

Rather, my primary complaint with the film is that there were too many times where they couldn't follow through on a potentially good joke. There were several instances where I could see a joke being set up and when the punchline was delivered, I was disappointed. A perfect example of this is when owner/coach/player of the Flint Tropics, Jackie Moon (Ferrell) is trying to stop his team from scoring 125 points because that would mean all fans would get a free corndog and he doesn't have any corndogs to give away. When the Tropics do manage to score the 125 points, you're excited to see how Jackie will handle the situation. Will he talk his way out of it? Will the fans riot? Will he try giving them other things and pass them off as corndogs? Nope, none of those viable choices happen. Instead, when the game ends Jackie simply runs out of the arena and the whole scenario is never brought up again. Talk about a major letdown.

Perhaps the most obvious evidence of lazy writing is the film's decision to use coarse language as a substitute for actual humor. The film garnered an R rating purely for its language, most of which was unnecessary. It's not that the language was offensive; it was merely unnecessary. Using foul language sporadically can often produce funny situations, but when it's an endless barrage of f bombs and c words it grows tiresome. The writers needed to use some imagination and not just resort to old tactics when seaching for a laugh.

This is not to say that I sat stonefaced throughout the entire movie. There are several moments of hilarity sprinkled throughout the film. I enjoyed when the Tropics and their opponents engage in a brawl only during a commercial break so that the ABA commissioner won't see any of it occurring. Will Arnett and Andrew Daly as the Tropics announce team also provide a lot of laughs. While the laughs here may have been acceptable in a different comedy, when you go see a Will Ferrell movie you expect a better laugh to dud ratio.

Perhaps the laughs could have been better had they not decided to devote so much time to a subplot involving another Tropics player, Ed Monix (played by Woody Harrelson) pining over a past girlfriend (Maura Tierney). The story is almost a carbon copy of the Tom Berenger/Rene Russo subplot in Major League, but it seems really out of place in this film here. It's not given enough time to make sense and produces zero emotional ressonance with the audience.

In many ways, the film resembles the ABA. It is a cheap imitation of a quality product. It relied on heavy promotion to stay relevant (how many commercials did Will Ferrell do dressed as Jackie Moon?) It contains appealing elements, but the product as a whole isn't sustainable. And finally, it too will end soon and become a mere footnote in its industry.

Those looking for a cheap laugh can probably catch this at the cheap theater and enjoy themselves. For most people, however, waiting until this comes on cable will probably be your best bet. Believe me, having the film's language cleaned up on TV will not eliminate the few jokes that exist in the film. I would have liked another Ferrell gem, but I should have known that this wouldn't be up to snuff with some of his other classics when it got a February release. To finish off my basketball analogies, I would say that this film isn't a complete air ball, but the shot definitely falls short. Grade: C