Popcorn Perspectives with Danny Minton
Week of March 13, 2023
Champions
Rated PG-13 for crude/sexual references and strong language
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 56%
In Theaters
From Dumb & Dumber and Kingpin director Robert Farrelly comes this sweet and sappy comedy about a semi-pro basketball coach who is forced to coach a team of adults with intellectual disabilities for community service after getting a DUI. Needing to get his own life in order, he begins to grow with the team as he makes them better players while at the same time making himself a better human. Much of the film is exactly what you think it will be from the trailer. It is sweet and corny and overly predictable. But thankfully there are many surprises thrown at the audience from the eclectic bunch of actors who manage to catch you completely off guard throughout. You can tell that he and the cast have a real heart for this special community and he does a superb job of creating both awareness and appreciation. While it’s not as shocking as many of Farrelly’s other films, and also not nearly as funny, it more than makes up for it in sentimentality. Much of the humor comes from sex and fart jokes, which aren’t exactly clever, but at least they come off as sort of humorous given the context. Unfortunately, some of the jokes are repeated again and again when they weren’t that funny to begin with. I really liked the effort and the attitude, but as a comedy it tends to miss the basket more than it hits. But it also manages to give enough of a feel good vibe that you find the faults to be forgivable. B-