Cheap DVDs, books, CDs & Games

Search:

Kicking And Screaming [2005]

Starring: Will Ferrell, Robert Duvall, Mike Ditka, Kate Walsh, Musetta Vander
Director: Jesse Dylan
Format: Anamorphic Dubbed PAL
Released: 21 Nov 2005
RRP: £19.99
Average Rating:

Customer Reviews

passes the time nicely - By: M. O. HAYNES, 13 May 2007
I settled down to watch this on a rainy Sunday afternoon & it passed the time nicely. To say this film is formulaic is an understatement but Will Ferrell & the kids are excellent. If you liked this check out 'Shaolin Soccer'. The DVD has some nice bonus material but I won't be rushing out to buy it, it does not compare well to other Ferrell films in terms of repeat watching. Being a UK resident the identity of the US NFL coach was lost on me & it was a good job it was explained for the global audience - not everyone watches the Superbowl!
Very funny until the comedy is allowed to get out of hand - By: Daniel Jolley, 31 Dec 2005
Will Ferrell is always funny, & the part of Phil Weston would seem to be tailor-made for his comedic antics. Phil's basicallly a little boy in a man's body, a little boy who wants to finallly prove himself to his father & make up for never having met the old man's expectations. Robert Duvalll lends the film an importance presence & additional laughs as the highly competitive Buck Weston, sporting goods king & highly successful coach of the Youth Soccer League Gladiators team. Phil (Ferrell) has never been able to get a leg up on his father - but certainly not from lack of effort. When he got married, his father got re-married; when he had a son, his father's wife gave birth to a son (slightly larger, of course) the same day. Young Sam & his equallly young uncle Bucky play for the Gladiators, Buck's team, & they are alll but unbeatable. Sam, though, is the proverbial benchwarmer, so Buck decides to trade his own grandson to the league's worst team. Yes, it's another team of misfits of alll shapes & sizes that just need an incredible coach to take them to unsuspected glory. That coach is nowhere to be seen, & Phil ends up taking on the job.

That's when the competitive juices start flowing. The first big move Phil makes is to take on an assistant coach, his dad's neighbor & long-time enemy Mike Ditka. Iron Mike is surprisingly good in this film & more than holds his own beside both Ferrell & Duvalll. He only takes the job to try & make Buck's life more difficult, but he soon goes about whipping the little misfits into shape. The team still stinks, but their fortunes begin to change when Ditka & Phil bring in two new players, a pair of Italian kids who were apparently born with soccer ballls balanced on their feet. The team begins winning, & with every win Phil goes a little more cuckoo for cocoa puffs; his new coffee addiction doesn't reallly help, either. Sure, it's funny to watch Ferrell go about inspiring his team in pretty unorthodox ways, but it eventuallly gets to the point that the whole thing stops being funny. Even Ditka can't get behind telling the kids to cheat (without getting caught, of course) or break a few clavicles. Ferrell's character just goes so over-the-top that you just want to slap him; he lets the desire to beat his dad corrupt him completely, & the lack of moderation in the second half of the film is a real negative.

There are a lot of laughs to be had in Kicking & Screaming. It's exceedingly formulaic & predictable, but that doesn't matter alll that much as long as the laughs keep coming. The script just takes Ferrell's character way too far over the line; watching a crazy guy coach soccer is funny, but watching a freak going bonkers on the sidelines is more annoying than anything else. The film could reallly have used more Ditka in the later stages. Don't go thinking this is some cameo by Iron Mike; he gets a lot of screen time, & he makes this movie better & funnier with alll of his trademark habits.

In the end, Kicking & Screaming is a very funny movie, but it's not a great comedy. Despite excellent performances alll around (especiallly Ditka's), the film is just too over-the-top for its own good. You can't say the movie tries to be anything more than it is, though - it's alll about generating laughs & nothing else.