Balls of Fury (2007)

"Like Jack Black, but not as sarcastic, [Dan Fogler] brings a winning enthusiasm to the role.  Andy Spletzer, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
"Stupendously silly but viciously funny.  Kamal AL-Solaylee, The Globe and Mail
"The movie flaunts its ridiculousness and offers a relentless string of jokes about blindness, groin-bashing, and bodily odors.  Mark Feeney, Boston Globe

Editor's Note It's ping-pong played to the death in this balls-out comedy: Dan Fogler stars as pong child prodigy and Def Leppard-devotee Randy Daytona, whose defeat at the hands of a hissy East German (Thomas Lennon) during the 1988 Olympics forced him leave the world of ping-pong competition in disgrace. Randy's life is a shambles until he gets recruited by CIA agent (Barry Lopez) to infiltrate an ENTER THE DRAGON-style ping-pong tournament (to the death), run by an evil triad leader (Christopher Walken). First Randy needs to get back in shape; enter James Hong (BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA) as the blind ping-pong master Wang and Maggie Q as his sexy, kung fu-fighting niece. While FURY is a consistently funny comedy it also manages to sluly infuse some intelligence and compassion into its steady stream of genre spoofery and lowbrow crotch gags (similar in that sense to Mel Brooks' BLAZING SADDLES). Fogler has an engagingly scruffy underdog-style warmth and seems to really connect with the older pros like Walken and Hong; there's the sense everyone had a good time making this film, which carries over to the audience. Director Robert Ben Garant knows when to speed up the action and when to give his actors room to stretch out; the result is a generous spirit where all the cast is allowed to grab their share of the laughs. There's also some awesome Def Lepard tunes on the soundtrack, and Maggie Q is one smokin' hot babe.

	Aisha Tyler
	Christopher Walken
	Dan Fogler
	David Koechner
	Diedrich Bader
	George Lopez
	James Hong
	Kerri Kenney-Silver
	Maggie Q
	Patton Oswalt
	Robert Patrick
	Terry Crews
	Jeff Knipp - Production Designer
	John Refoua - Editor
	Kent Alterman - Executive Producer
	Randy Edelman - Original Music By
	Robert Ben Garant - Director
	Robert Ben Garant - Writer
	Roger Birnbaum - Producer
	Steve Arnold - Art Director
	Thomas E. Ackerman - Cinematographer
	Thomas Lennon - Writer

Film Comment
"[T]he laughs are warm and occasionally hard, thanks to a decent script by director Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon, some fairly ingenious ping-pong sight gags, and affable newcomer Dan Fogler." 07/01/2007 p.73

Sight and Sound
"[T]here's an endearing visual brashness to the film, while Dan Fogler, the Tony-winning Broadway actor who plays Daytona delivers his gags well." 02/01/2008 p.52

Variety 6 of 10
Relentlessly silly in spoofing martial-arts movie conventions, "Balls of Fury" has roughly enough laughs for a first-class trailer but wheezes, gasps and finally goes flat through much of its 90 minutes...In some respects, the movie proves most notable for its oddities. In no particular order, these include 78-year-old movie vet James Hong stealing every scene he's in; Christopher Walken's quirky, villainous turn in a gaudy costume that calls to mind Francis Ford Coppola's "Dracula"; "Heroes" star Masi Oka in a blink-and-you-miss-him cameo; and Jason Scott Lee -- who played Bruce Lee in "Dragon" -- in an only slightly less abbreviated appearance, almost unrecognizable under a mop of unruly hair...Pic doesn't really serve an ace until its closing credits roll, accompanied by the entire cast's raucous, energetic rendition of Def Leppard's "Pour Some Sugar on Me" that comes as too little, too late. Beyond that, the movie's clever marketing slogan -- "A huge comedy with tiny balls" -- actually has it backward, inasmuch as it takes huge balls to make such grandiose claims about a comedy this tiny. - Brian Lowry

DVD Talk 5 of 10
I'm honestly stunned to consider how dreadful "Balls of Fury" actually is. This picture had the potential to be the break-out sillyfest of the year, yet nothing comedic sticks to the screen. The film just stumbles around, without any personality or direction, looking for laughs in all the wrong places...Clearly "Fury" is abusing the template from 2004's sleeper smash "Dodgeball," a similar obscure sport farce that had far greater luck sniffing laughs out of the minutiae of elementary school gym class recreation. "Fury" is much more slovenly concoction, figuring the very inclusion of Ping-Pong equals comedy gold, letting the rest of the picture slide by without much thought. I hate to break it to the filmmakers, but Table Tennis just isn't all that funny, no matter how much competitive masculinity is assigned to it...Resorting to crotch-wallops, gay panic situations, fart jokes, "Date Movie" level satiric jabs at Hollywood conventions (bullet-time?), heavily underlined retro kisses (Def Leppard is mentioned at least 100 times in the film), and a plot that's dying to find something to do, and this leaves "Balls of Fury" an official waste of time and a must to avoid. - Brian Orndorf