Movie Review The Underdoggs

The Underdoggs (2024) 

Directed by Charles Stone III

Written by Danny Segal, Isaac Schamis 

Starring Snoop Dogg, Tika Sumpter, Mike Epps 

Release Date January 26th, 2024 

Published January 25th, 2024 

I know it's wrong. I am well aware that the new Amazon Prime-Snoop Dogg comedy, The Underdoggs is objectively, not a good movie. It's amateurish, it's childish, it's derivative, and it's needlessly filthy for a movie that features a mostly child cast. And yet, there is this undeniable element that I cannot deny and that is my affection for Snoop Dogg. Snoop has crafted one of the more eclectic and straight up odd careers in entertainment history. He was a fearsome gangsta rapper who may or may not have been involved in actual murders. He's also a close friend and partner to Martha Stewart. He's known for smoking more weed than your average small American city and is one of the most savvy marketers of his brand going today. He's an enigma, a dynamic, charming and entirely unpredictable character. 

It's that same unpredictable, enigmatic charm that Snoop brings to his first film leading role since the failed horror franchise Bones in 2001, Snoop has a laid back charisma that I find irresistible. Snoop is Jaycen Two J's Jennings in The Underdoggs, a disgraced former NFL Wide Receiver better known for his bad behavior than his on the field heroics. In a classic Mighty Ducks scenario, Jaycen gets himself into an accident that is entirely his fault and is sentenced to community service. In this case, Jaycen is sentenced to cleaning up a park in his old neighborhood in Long Beach. While cleaning up dog poop, Jaycen sees a group of kids playing Pee-Wee Football, badly. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review Blue Beetle

Blue Beetle (2023) 

Directed by Angel Manuel Soto 

Written by Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer 

Starring Xolo Mariduena, Bruna Marquezine, Adriana Barraza, Damian Alcazar, Susan Sarandon, George Lopez 

Release Date August 18th, 2023 

Published August 18th, 2023 

What I loved about Blue Beetle is the enthusiasm that pours forth from every frame of this movie. There is a sense of wonder and delight even in as the movie laying out a heartbreaking backstory for main character, Jaime Reyes (Xolo Mariduena). Jaime, as we join the story, has become the first member of his family to graduate from college. Sadly, he's returning home to a lot of bad news. His father, Alberto (Damian Alcazar), has suffered a heart attack and is no longer working. His not working led to the family losing their auto repair business. And the family home is about to be foreclosed upon. 

Jaime feels responsible as his parents had gone to great lengths to get him into college. Now, he's back home and he can't find work. He can't afford to go back to college to complete his law degree and he's trapped in a world where his education doesn't mean nearly as much as the color of his skin. The racial divide in Palmera City is very obvious and seems to have been engineered by the Kord Corporation, headed up by the vicious and vindictive Victoria Kord (Susan Sarandon), a weapons manufacturer preparing to release her most terrifying new weapon, super-soldier suits based on an ancient technology. 

Standing in Victoria's way is her niece, Jenny Kord (Bruna Marquezine), daughter of Ted Kord, the benevolent former CEO. Jenny wants to carry on her father's legacy of community involvement and investment. She wants to get out of the weapons business completely. Naturally, this places her in conflict with Victoria to a point that places Jenny's life at risk. In a desperate attempt to stop Victoria, Jenny makes a big play. Sneaking into the Kord labs, Jenny steals an ancient piece of alien technology known as The Scarab. The Scarab is the key to Victoria's plans and without it, she's got nothing. 

As Jenny tries to sneak The Scarab out of Kord she runs into Jaime and enlists him to sneak the ancient artifact out of the building. The two had met the day before when Victoria fired Jaime and his sister, Milagro Reyes (Belissa Escobedo) from their cleaning jobs at her resort home. Jaime developed an immediate crush on Jenny so, naturally, he's happy to help her in this moment, unaware of the level of danger he's inviting into his life and the life of his family. 

The legend of The Scarab is that it chooses the person that it will attach itself to. The choice is based on who The Scarab believes is worthy to wield its magical powers. When Jaime picks up The Scarab he has no idea that he would be the one the ancient alien tech would choose. Once The Scarab does choose Jaime however, Blue Beetle kicks into second gear as the war between Jaime, his family and Victoria Kord's army of super soldiers, led by the ruthless Carapax (Raoul Max Trujillo), is on. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media

Movie Review: Balls of Fury

Balls of Fury (2007) 

Directed by Robert Ben Garant

Written by Thomas Lennon, Robert Ben Garant

Starring Dan Fogler, Christopher Walken, George Lopez, Maggie Q, Robert Patrick

Release Date August 29th, 2007

Published August 30th, 2007

Who is Dan Fogler? That is the question many who see the movie Balls of Fury will ask. Of course, most won't see Balls of Fury because they don't know who Dan Fogler is. Quite a conundrum. Nevertheless, Fogler is an acclaimed actor. He won a Tony award, Broadway's highest honor, for his work in the musical "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee ''.How one goes from Broadway star to the star of a movie about ping pong is one of those curious quirks of Hollywood. Something linked Fogler to the guys from Reno 911, Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon, and thus they came to cast Fogler in their latest unfunny comedy Balls of Fury.

Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon are two of the creators of the often quite funny cops spoof Reno 911. However, their film work has been utterly atrocious. I've rundown the litany of their sins more than a few times and here they are again. The Pacifier, Taxi, Reno 911 Miami and Herbie Fully Loaded. Blech! Balls of Fury is as inept and misguided as any of those features.

The story begins at the 1988 olympics. 12 year old Randy Daytona (Dan Fogler) is America's hope for the gold in Ping Pong. Unfortunately, Randy gets beaten badly and embarrasses himself by knocking himself cold and proclaiming he was going to Disney World. Nearly 20 years later Randy is still playing ping pong, as a performer in a low class Vegas casino lunch room populated by the soon to the grave crowd.

There, Randy is approached by an FBI agent, Rodriguez (George Lopez), who explains that Randy is America's best chance to capture a legendary Chinese mafia figure known as Feng (Christopher Walken). Feng, it seems, is a ping pong aficionado and is holding an underground tournament for the best players in the world. Randy must get back in shape and with the help of ping pong guru (James Hong) and his smoking hot daughter Maggie (Maggie Q), prepare to play ping pong to the death.

Thomas Lennon and Ben Garant come from the world of sketch comedy and improv and you can see the influence of that in Balls of Fury. Sudden death ping pong is a good sketch comedy premise. Unfortunately, when stretched to the length of a feature film it wears thin quickly. You can see throughout Balls of Fury a number of unformed ideas that begin with the potential to be funny but peter out as the actors search for the punchline.

Dan Fogler is not a well known actor unless of course you are a fan of Broadway. The comic actor won a Tony Award for his work in "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee". Of course few actors, even one with a Tony on his resume, could make this material work. Fogler's co-stars Maggie Q and George Lopez are only slightly more entertaining than Fogler, each struggling with the bad material and unformed ideas. Then there is poor James Hong. As Fogler's ping pong guru this longtime character actor is repeatedly humiliated in the filmmaker's attempt to find something funny.

The only actor to survive and even grasp this horrible concept is Christopher Walken. The legendary Mr. Walken finds what little funny there is in Balls of Fury by simply doing his own thing. Walken crafts his wacked out bad guy character, commits to every detail and belts it to the back of the room. Walken's seemingly method approach to this bizarre character, an American pretending to be a Chinese gangster, is at times utterly sublime simply for Walken's dedication to playing it straight.

Balls of Fury is a bad movie. Poorly crafted, poorly conceived and stunningly sloppy for a mainstream Hollywood release. Thomas Lennon and Ben Garant have once again failed miserably in attempting to translate their unique brand of sketch and improv comedy to the big screen. And yet, Christoper Walken is so classically Walken-esque, there is almost a reason to subject yourself to this piece of junk. I'm far from willing to recommend Balls of Fury, but fans of Christopher Walken with a lot of time to spare may find something oddly entertaining.

Movie Review: The Spy Next Door

The Spy Next Door (2010) 

Directed by Brian Levant 

Written by Jonathan Bernstein, James Greer, Gregory Poirier 

Starring Jackie Chan, Amber Valletta, Madeline Carroll, George Lopez

Release Date January 15th, 2010 

Published January 14th, 2010 

It is far too easy to rip a movie like The Spy Next Door. The plot is dimwitted and derivative, star Jackie Chan has far too little mastery of the English language to be given this many lines, and the supporting cast is a minefield of overacting and over-arching cuteness. Way too easy. The harder thing to do is admit that despite all the garbage in The Spy Next Door, there are a few modest pleasures and even a couple of smiles to be had.

The Spy Next Door is an accidental re-imagining of Vin Diesel's Disney flick The Pacifier. Take the world's greatest super-spy and leave him in charge of some precocious pre-teens and wait for wacky stuff to happen. The only difference is where Diesel seems terribly uncomfortable; Jackie Chan seems right at home playing with the kids.

Chan is secret agent Bob Ho, a spy on loan to the CIA from Chinese Intelligence. Bob is tracking a Russian bad guy named Poldark (Magnus Scheving) and his evil gal Friday, Creel (Katherine Boecher) as they seek to destroy the world supply of oil. Helping Bob are a pair of CIA agents, Glaze (George Lopez) and Colton (Billy Ray Cyrus).

Meanwhile, Bob is looking to wrap up his spy career so that he can marry his next door neighbor Gillian (Amber Valletta) who does not know that Bob is really a spy. Even bigger than that obstacle however is getting in good with Gillian's three kids. Farren (Madeline Carroll) is a severely moody oldest daughter who nastily calls her mom Gillian. Ian (Will Shadley) is the middle child and a power nerd who, though only 9, reads physics for fun. And finally 4 year Nora (Alina Foley) who is convinced that Bob is what Ian calls a ‘cyborg.’ Together the siblings look to get rid of boring Bob before he can marry mommy.

Yes, the plot is exceedingly dopey and condescendingly simple. But, you know that when you buy the ticket. Given that knowledge going in makes it easier to appreciate the few charms that The Spy Next Door has. Jackie Chan is now 50 years old and years of daring stunt work have taken their toll. Nevertheless, Chan gives it a go in The Spy Next Door and his brand of martial arts crossed with Buster Keaton style slapstick hasn't been this much fun in a while.

The kids in kid’s movies can be terribly irritating, either too precious or too grating. They are at times both in The Spy Next Door. That said each of the child actors has a good moment or two, especially young Alina Foley. It's cheating to have a sweet little four year old whisper 'I love you bob' as he sings her to sleep with a Chinese lullaby, but it's hard to deny how cute the scene is.

The Spy Next Door is not 'cinema.' This is not a great movie but it never pretends to be. The Spy Next Door is briskly paced, breezy, goofy and, best of all, over before you really tire of its idiot plot. By the lowered standards of kid’s entertainment this qualifies as something I can recommend. Kids won't be harmed by it and mom and dad may actually stay awake during most of it. What more can you ask of low rent kids entertainment.