Dodgeball! A True Underdog Story
Directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber
Written by Rawson Marshall Thurber
Starring Vince Vaughn, Ben Stiller, Christine Taylor, Justin Long, Stephen Root, Jason Bateman
Release Date June 18th, 2004
Published June17th, 2004
USA Today has dubbed them The Frat Pack. Actors Vince Vaughn, Ben Stiller, Owen and Luke Wilson and Will Ferrell. Each has a tendency to appear in each other’s movies either as co-stars or in cameos. They tend to work with the same directors and writers. Most importantly they have teamed to make some of the funniest movies of the past few years. In Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, it's Vaughn and Stiller teaming up and once again the Frat Pack's brand of scatological insanity is in full effect for one very funny movie.
Vaughn stars as Peter La Fleuer, the slacker owner of a rundown little gym called Average Joe's. Peter takes a rather laid back approach to running the gym, patrons come and go as they please and pay for their memberships whenever they feel like it. It's no surprise that Peter's management now finds the gym in debt for about 50 grand in unpaid bills.
According to the bank's investigator, Kate (Christine Taylor), if Peter can't raise the cash in 30 days the gym will be sold to White Goodman (Stiller) the Napoleon-esque owner of Globo-Gym. White wants to flatten Average Joe's and turn it into a parking lot. He also wants Kate, who wants nothing to with him. despite her better judgment she is interested in Peter and his collection of wacky gym rats.
While Peter seems perfectly comfortable with closing the gym, his regulars including high school cheerleader Justin (Justin Long), obscure sports loving Gordon (Stephen Root) and Steve the Pirate (Allen Tudyk) who honestly believes he is a pirate, want to fight to save it. Their only hope is a 50,000-dollar grand prize dodgeball tournament in Las Vegas. Win the tournament and save the gym.
Of course Dodgeball is not about it's wacky tournament but the comic touches surrounding it and the hysterically over the top characters pulling it all off. First-time director Rawson Marshall Thurber is raw but knows a funny gag when sees one. The script is kind of a combination of Baseketball and a straight sports movie. Surprisingly though, there is little of the grossout humor expected of this kind of movie. Somehow the film earned a PG - 13 rating and you never would have noticed.
Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn work terrifically together with Vaughn's slacker charm balancing Stiller's manic schtick. Some have compared this Stiller dunderhead to his character in Zoolander, similar low-IQ narcissism. However when you look further back into Stiller's career to his villainous turn in the kids movie Heavyweights, you see he has played this role before. Of course the same could be said of Vaughn who perfected this likable frat boy routine in Old School.
Regardless of the character recycling Dodgeball stands on it's own as one of the funniest movies of 2004. Right up their with another Stiller -Vaughn teaming, Starsky and Hutch. As long as the movies continue to be this funny, they can recycle as much as they want.
