A basketball movie with real heart
Despite their reputation as the 1990s and noughties grand-marshals of grossout humour, Peter and Bobby Farrelly have also repeatedly shown the differently abled as being normal and gifted.
From Kingpin to There’s Something About Mary and Stuck on You, they have been champions for those who might not have got a chance elsewhere in Hollywood – both in front of and behind the camera.
In 2005, they took things to a new level by executive producing a seemingly grotesque tale about two men’s attempts to subvert the Special Olympics.
While saddled with leading man (Jackass’ Johnny Knoxville) who struggled to play it straight, a cookie cutter plot that was basically boy-deceives-girl, boysees-error-of-his-ways-and-tries-towin-her-back and Brian Cox’s onedimensional villain, The Ringer allowed its non-celebrity cast members a chance to steal the limelight in the most subversive ways. Some, such as Edward Barbanell, outshone their more highly paid counterparts, as the movie even earned the endorsement of the Special Olympics.
Eighteen years on, Bobby Farrelly’s first solo directorial project is another crowd-pleasing, potentially more inspiring sports comedy, one that displays a surprising maturity, as if aimed at the young adults who enjoyed The Ringer almost two decades ago, rather than a whole new generation (although the story really does offer plenty of laughs and heart that will appeal to all ages). It probably helps that the narrative has a template, an award-winning Spanish movie that was the highest-grossing homegrown flick in Espan˜a in
2018.
Inspired by a real-life
Valencian basketball team that won 12 championships between 1999 and 2014, most of director Javier Fesser’s cast were nonprofessional actors, people with intellectual disabilities themselves.
It is a strategy Farrelly has followed in transplanting the tale to Des Moines, Iowa.
Already boasting a somewhat chequered coaching career, thanks to continuing issues with authority, Iowa Stallions assistant Marcus Markovic (Woody Harrelson, at his effortlessly charming and nuanced best) may have gone too far this time.
After being caught on camera shoving his boss Phil (Ernie Hudson) over a tactics disagreement, he then blots his copybook further by getting blotto and running into the back of a cop car while distractedly drinkdriving.
As well as being fired, Marcus finds himself facing either 18 months in prison or 90 days of community service.
While initially reluctant to take the latter, he eventually sees sense, especially when he discovers it will be using his particular special set of skills.
However, as a team whose clearly best player refuses to be coached by him, while another’s go-to, nay only, shot is a behindthe-back ‘‘Hail Mary’’ and a third is the brother of his most recent, less-than-cordial one-night-stand, ‘‘the Friends’’ seem certain to test his abilities, resolve – and patience.
Thanks to a smart, surprisingly emotion-filled script by hit animated comedy Gravity Falls writer Mark Rizzo and Farrelly’s sensitive direction, what could have been a mawkish or uncomfortable watch is instead a thoroughly entertaining delight.
Its secret sauce is in treating all its characters as adults, with Harrelson and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’s Kaitlin Olson demonstrating plenty of chemistry and depth as a middle-aged couple trying to navigate all their baggage, while both also look to be having a ball in the scenes with their less well-known co-stars.
To be fair, they are a charismatic bunch, with Kevin Iannucci as Olson’s Alex’s brother Johnny and Madison Tevlin’s tough talking Consentino the real scene-stealers. There are times when you can tell they have clearly gone off-script – and the comedy is all the better for it.
Likewise, the basketball action is some of the most authenticlooking to feature in a Hollywood movie for some time.
It is by no means perfect – the narrative beats are – for the most part – thoroughly predictable but just when you think you know where this heartwarming movie is headed, it throws a little shimmy or feint that leaves you smiling at its chutzpah, nimbleness and sheer desire to entertain.
Champions is now screening in cinemas nationwide.