Balls of Fury (2007)

"Enter the Dragon" with ping pong

"Balls of Fury" is a competent and amusing movie. As the previous reviewer put it, it's silly fun. It rarely provokes anything more than amusement - this is not a belly-laugh kind of comedy. But "Balls of Fury" provides laughs for 90 minutes and then fades to a bizarre music video that may be the best part of the film, and that's enough for me. Thomas Lennon and Diedrich Bader steal every scene they're in, with Lennon's East German ping-pong ubermensch being perhaps the best character in the film.

"Balls of Fury" is worth a rent if you're in the mood for a comedy and you've seen the other comedies on the shelf already. You'll probably forget you ever saw it two weeks later, but at least you'll enjoy it while you're watching it. July 31, 2008

SILLY HARMLESS FUN! 2 1/2 STARS!

'Balls Of Fury' isn't a great film, but it has some very funny moments. Silly and harmless with some good comedic performances by Walken, Lopez and Co. It's a short film that's pretty easy to sit through, if your in the mood for this sort of thing. Lots of jokes about.......balls! If ya get my drift. ;-b July 30, 2008

I should feel fury for watching it

Balls of Fury wasn't really funny to me. It TRIED to be funny, but failed. It's about a man who gets involved in a tradition where it's believed ping pong is the most important thing in the world, and as a result, the man goes through tournaments until he meets the very best player.

Unfortunately, the story is WAY too goofy for its own good to really feel any positive vibes from the tournament as the man kept winning. In other words, you won't really care about the guy as he keeps winning because the entire story is one extremely goofy segment straight into another, and all the while NONE of it is even remotely funny. It's just a greatly exaggerated story that does nothing to keep me interested. Come on, if a ping pong player loses, he has to DIE by having darts shot in his neck? Or how about the scene involving the supposed "dragon master" of ping pong, and it turned out to be a little schoolgirl?

None of that stuff works for me I'm afraid. And nothing really happens with the ping pong aspect of the storyline. At least, not as much as it *should* be focused on ping pong.

It's best to skip this one. July 28, 2008

Solid Comedy, if you are in the mood

Reading the reviews I can understand why this movie can be funny. My wife and I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I could imagine someone not liking it if their funny bone wasnt working that day.

I would say if you liked these movies - Dumb and Dumber, Reno 911, Dodgeball - then this movie will be very funny to you.

July 7, 2008

if you've seen the previews, you've seen the movie

We bought this, having seen the previews and finding them irresistible. Unfortunately, if you've seen the preview (and if not, check it out on YouTube), you've seen the entire movie, or at least the good parts.

Randy Daytona (Dan Fogler) is a ping pong has-been, reduced to doing a variety act, until he's approached by FBI agent Rodriguez (George Lopez) to help take down Feng (Christopher Walken), the man responsible for his father's death.

To do that, Randy needs to be invited to Feng's extreme ping pong tournament, but he hasn't competed since his Olympic humiliation 18 years ago, so they hire blind ping pong master Wong (James Hong) and his niece (Maggie Q) to get him up to speed.

I didn't expect a whole lot from this, and that's pretty much what I got. The premise is tissue-thin, and the film (or maybe it was just me) seemed to be holding its breath until Christopher Walken showed up, halfway through the movie, which is when it really started.

Christopher Walken was brilliant, as usual, and James Hong is always enjoyable. George Lopez was amusing but underutilized, and Maggie Q was pretty much wasted as eye candy. Dan Fogler fit the character well, and was sympathetic and entertaining, and Diedrich Bader was hilarious as a male courtesan. It just felt like with a bit more to the script, it could have been better than it was. June 29, 2008

More reviews at Amazon.com ...