Semi-Pro
Written by Scot Armstrong
Directed by Kent Alterman
New Line Cinema
2008
Rating:


"Semi-Pro" aspires to the absurdity of "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy" and the underdog sports parody of "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story" and ends up painfully strained in the effort. Will Ferrell, again skewering misplaced white male machismo, plays a one-hit-wonder turned basketball team owner and player Jackie Moon. Jackie's team, the Flint Tropics, is in the American Basketball Association and is at risk of being dissolved when the National Basketball Association absorbs the struggling league. Jackie's comic desperation to turn the fan-less and largely untalented Tropics one of the four teams to make it to the NBA forces him to play actual basketball with the help of aging player Monix (Woody Harrelson) and perform crazy promotional stunts. There's some inspired lunacy, like Jackie wrestling a bear and deliriously extended scenes in which Jackie tries to throw up and make a free-throw, but in comparison to the overtly similar "Major League" and "Dodgeball," "Semi-Pro" shoots a brick.

Posted Friday, February 29, 2008

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