Will Ferrell Taladegas the figure skating world
Written: Apr 07 '07
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Product Rating:
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| Bang For The Buck |
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Pros: Ferrell (mostly), some funny jokes, mascot abuse!
Cons: Heder isn't quite as strong, too much potty humour
The Bottom Line: Hilarious at times, but other times pretty awful, this is an average comedy
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| hist's Full Review: Blades of Glory |
Will Ferrell is very hit or miss for me. There are times he's hilarious and times that he's extremely dumb. Then there are movies like Blades of Glory which are funnier than they have any right to be but still kind of dumb. I went into this movie not expecting much, as we had movie passes that expire at the end of April to burn and nothing that we really wanted to watch (the theater down the street can be like that sometimes). We needed a second movie for our Grindhouse day. What I got was a lot of laughs that ultimately I felt a little ashamed of laughing at. Not all of them worked, but enough did to make a satisfying movie experience.
Chazz Michael Michales (Ferrell) is a sex-addict figure skater who mows his own path, with no coach, no family, and no friends. His wild style has taken the figure skating world by storm, and the women seem to love him. Jimmy McElroy (Jon Heder) was a skating prodigy from day one who was adopted out of an orphanage at the age of four so that his "father" (William Fichtner) could turn him into a superstar. After co-winning the gold medal, the two heated rivals get into a fight, accidentally setting the mascot on fire and getting themselves permanently banned from skating. But a loophole is discovered that will let them compete in the pairs competition, the first male-male duo to ever do so. This, of course, threatens the reigning champs of that world, Stranz and Fairchild Van Waldenberg (Will Arnett and Amy Poehler), and hijinks ensue as they work toward the gold medal.
Blades of Glory is one of those movies that the trailer makes it actually look stupider than it actually is (much like my experience with Absolutely Fabulous on Comedy Central, where the promos actually pushed me away from it but desperation for something to watch made me tune into something that I ultimately found to be one of the best comedies out there). I was very turned off by the ads for this movie, mostly because the jokes, taken out of context look stupid rather than funny. In the context of the movie, these same jokes were actually amusing.
Not all of them, of course. There are way too many potty jokes and other examples of crude humour, but that's what keeps the young folks engaged, I guess. Some jokes labour too hard to get to the punchline and never quite reach it (such as the running joke of Jimmy's obsessed fan). The ending (and I mean the final scene, not the actual climax of the movie) is so stupid that my eyes almost rolled out my head. The whole movie is corny, but this took it to the extreme.
Obviously, the movie is not supposed to be realistic at all, but at times the movie takes too much advantage of the audience's suspension of disbelief to take that even further. Chazz's routine at the opening of the movie has no figure skating moves whatsoever but we're expected to believe that he gets almost perfect scores? Yes, I laughed at his routine but I cringed as the movie hunted down my suspension, which I had stored away in a hidden place knowing that it would not be used that day, and executed it with no mercy whatsoever. Also, during the climactic skate, the official calls out that all skaters must be on the ice in 20 seconds, and then says the same thing a couple of minutes later as one of our heroes is in the process of showing up.
So far, there's been a lot of complaining, but I did ultimately enjoy Blades of Glory. A little Ferrell can go a long way, so if you can't stand the man then you won't want to see this movie. If you're a lukewarm fan like I am, however, he delivers a very good performance in this one. He's funny and outrageous, but only occasionally going too far. He's the master at the slightly overweight man being naked (or almost) and making the audience laugh with it. Thankfully, he doesn't try to make Chazz too sympathetic (they could have easily tried to force the love story on him) but he does change during the movie and it's funny watching his resistance to this.
Jon Heder isn't quite as good, as Ferrell dominates him most of the time they're on screen together. However, he does play the dweebish (or in this case, inexperienced because of his sheltered upbringing) character very well. In fact, they play off each other better than I thought they would. He's not as good in scenes with other characters, but otherwise he's good. I was really impressed with Jenna Fischer (from The Office), as she played the other Van Waldenberg sister (and Heder's romantic interest) almost perfectly. She's able to play that very shy personality perfectly and the audience has a lot of sympathy for her given her family situation. Poehler and Arnett are great as well, with the nice added touch that they're so into skating that they glide when they walk around their room at times. Yes, they play "evil" a bit too broadly at times, but overall they do a good job.
Blades of Glory is not comedy at its best. It will make you groan, roll your eyes, and stare at it with a stony expression at times. But many of the jokes work and you will find yourself laughing much more than you thought you would. Me and the wife must have a thing about mascots because two of them get abused in this movie and both scenes were the funniest in the film. I was also quite pleased to see all of the figure skating cameos, with Sasha Cohen being the funniest (and crudest, actually). The actors are likable enough and the humour works enough that it's an enjoyable way to spend ninety minutes. I'm not sure I'd pay full price for it, but it's certainly worth a look-see.
Recommended:
Yes
Movie Mood: Funny Movie
Viewing Method: Other
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Member: David Roy
Location: Vancouver, BC
Reviews written: 721
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