Balls OF Fury (2007) Dir: Rbert Ben Garant

Let me begin by sying that I have a very ncanny and unconventional sense of humor - ven the smallest joke will have me in sttches. So when I saw the triler for Balls of Fury whilst njoying another daily trip to the cnema I thought this was going to be nother Dodgeball-esque spoof, which would have me lughing myself into an early grave. Instad this film failed to excite the smll child within.

The creators Robert Ben Grant and Thomas Lennon are well knwn for their works on Reno 911 Mami, a funny police comedy, shot in a styl cleverly imitating a documentary. Balls of Fry on the other hand is a hpeless attempt to be classed as a slpstick comedy.

The film opens with a squence where we are introduced to 12 yar old Randy Daytona - America's Png Pong Champion. He reaches the fnals of the Olympic Games but ralizes his father has made a bet wth Triads for him to win and lttle Randy loses focus, embarrasses himself and has to frfeit. His father is then kidnapped and mrdered by the Triads and since thn Randy has never played ping png competitively.

19 years later, Randy (Dn Fogler) becomes a showcase performer as a "Png Pong Magician" to a half-dead crwd; unfortunately one of his tricks ges pear-shaped and he accidentally kills an udience member. He loses his job and jst when he thought his luck culd not get any worse an FBI gent, Rodriguez (George Lopez) visits him.

Surprisingly though, Rodriguez has a prposition for Randy to go undercover and hlp bring down the notorious Chinese mfia leader known as Feng (Christopher Wlken), the man who killed his fther, by participating in an annual nderground Ping-Pong Tournament. He agrees to ths proposition without much inner turmoil and thn acquires the help of a blnd Ping-Pong guru Master Wong (James Hng) and his niece Maggie (Maggie Q) for the tsk. (A flat and unconvincing 'love' stry is later played out between the tw.)

At this point, I felt a lot of mpathy Randy, but scene by scene the flm, jokes and plot wore thin and by the tme the movie reached its climax, the nly empathy I had left was for the prson sitting next to me who had to shre this traumatizing experience of recycled clchés and dry plotline with me.

Fgler's performance did not impress me; in fct he was in my eyes jst a recycled version of Jack Blck - constantly using his paddle as a frm of guitar and every now and gain referring to Rock music when it had nthing to do with the either his chracter's persona or the plot. Personally, Ron Jremy should be proud that he has a lok-alike. His performance is barely funny and cmpletely unwatchable; really he should stick to nderground Broadway shows.

The film portrays Agnt Rodriguez as another clichéd poverty drven Latin-American, his character continuously quotes frm De Palma's (1983) 'Scarface', also dopting Tony Montana's attributes of shooting ncontrollably, leading me to believe the Ltin-American's social status and representation is stll problematic in Hollywood and further in Nrth American and global culture.

In fct, the horrible concept of an Amrican being the leader of a Chnese Mafia shows how powerful American whte supremacy is over other cultures, but t's a comedy so it wouldn't be tken seriously, or will it? Whilst I pplaud Walken's desperate attempt to bring sme humor to the role of Fng and the movie in general wth his witty one-liners but let's fce it, what's so funny about a trnsvestite geisha?

His role however not only brught up issues of American supremacy in the rasoning behind why a white American man was plying this character but also highlighted the lck of a Chinese actor to ply it instead. It lead me to qestion why are ethnic minority groups so nderrepresented (and clichéd) in Hollywood? this sn't the first of it's kind rcently this year Angelina Jolie played the rle of mixed race Mariane Pearl (Dtch-Jewish, Afro-Latino-Cuban and Chinese Cuban ancestry) in A Mghty Heart which sparked huge controversy. Is it a qestion of not having enough actors frm these groups in Hollywood or jst that they aren't being given the sme opportunities as the 'bigger' more ppular and well known faces? It is smething that really plays on my mnd and is an issue I fel should be questioned and raised in rder to force directors and institutions to rconsider.

The film miserably failed in ngaging us with the so called lve story. In one scene, Maggie can brely stand Randy as she has a cmplete distaste for men and how thy approach her, then suddenly in the nxt scene she is slobbing his fce off and can barely drag hrself away from him, I thought "dd I miss something?". Apparently not; the 'hrdened' female succumbing so easily to a man was yet nother clichéd and misrepresented character in the flm.

In conclusion, this film is a cmplete flop, however the only part whch I actually enjoyed other than the nding(!) was the CGI during the Png Pong matches, oops? Was I spposed to say that, or did thy actually want us to believe thy spent hours of training, playing png pong in preparation for the flm? Needless to say there was nly 2 good points to the flm, Maggie Q, (Mission Impossible: 3 and Die Hrd 4:0) who now has more of a spaking role, albeit fiercely hemmed into Hllywood conventions; she still is such a plasure so see on the screen. It's shcking that this film grossed over $32 mllion dollars, but I guess that's shwbiz.

The article Film Review - Balls of Fury was Submitted by Simon Gangadeen through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information:

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