If they made a movie about “professional” dodgeball, then I guess “professional” ping pong is the next logical step. Well, perhaps not logical per se, but whatever suitable substitution for the word logical you can think of should fit there. Of course, also in theatres now is the documentary King of Kong, about guys trying to prove they’re the best Donkey Kong player in the world. So into this celebration of all things that can barely be called sport, comes Balls of Fury, and one need not be a life long table tennis fanatic to enjoy the ride.



Tony award winner (huh?) Dan Fogler leads the cast as Randy Daytona, a washed-up former ping-pong prodigy that washed out of the Seoul Olympics in ’88 and saw his father murdered in a betting snafu. In the modern day, Randy’s approached by FBI agent Rodriguez (George Lopez) who wants to use Randy’s skills to smoke out underworld kingpin Feng (Christopher Walken), who gathers the best world players at his hidden compound for a sudden death tournament. (Meaning it ends with the losing player as a cadaver, or as Feng points out, “What part of ‘sudden death’ didn’t you understand?”)



The movie is silly for sure. It plays on widely accepted stereotypes as Randy’s Asian mentor is a blind Mr. Miyagi type with a wide pallet of insults and Randy’s German nemesis is an angry little deviant that does a little war scream before each competition. Oy, I can’t believe I was actually laughing at some of this stuff.



To be fair, while the material retraces familiar ground, the comedy chops of the actors is the thing that sells the show. And you would think that I’d think that Walken was slumming here, but actually, I loved his performance. It’s a great Walken as Walken role that makes you laugh from the first minute he appears on screen in costume.



But Walken isn’t an island unto himself, everybody contributes. Fogler is good, but he’s one of these background, sidekick player guys and seems a little out his element as the centre of attention, kind of like Andy Samberg in Hot Rod. Fortunately, everybody’s in the capable hands of Thomas Lennon and Ben Garant, who are two of the guys behind Reno 911. They smoothly make Balls of Fury a concise little package of laughs and an enjoyable hour-and-a-half of juvenile fun.



It’s not clever, it’s not subtle, but Balls of Fury is a relatively harmless bit of entertainment for the teenage boy in all of us. Gone from your mind not too soon after leaving the theatre, but you definitely remember that you enjoyed yourself.