An almost forgotten, but very funny movie.

Rating: 8/10 (26 March 2008)

David Zucker has made some funny movies in the past. Naked Gun and Airplane being the funniest. Trey Parker and Matt Stone are responsible for South Park, which at it's best is very funny. Putting them together, and you get one of the funniest sports parody movies ever!
The plot, and that's not really important is as follows : Two slackers (Parker and Stone) invent a new sport called Baseketball, a combination of Basketball and Baseball (naturally!). With rules involving psyching out your opponents by any means possible, it soon catches on through-out the country. When an unscrupulous owner of another club (Robert Vaughan) tries to change the rules, it's left to Parker and Stone to save the day.
The plot however, is merely an excuse for one of the funniest movies I've seen. Zucker, as he did when co-writing Airplane and The Naked Gun series, simply crams the movie with gag after gag. Some are visual, in the background while something more serious might be happening near the camera, or simply in the dialog which is hysterical. He also directs the material well.
Trey Parker and Matt Stone as Cooper and Remer acquit themselves well in the main roles. The supporting cast, led by Vaughan, are all good, getting the performances spot on. Special mention must go to Dian Bachar as Kenny 'Squeak' Scolari. The abuse he suffers during the movie gets a lot of laughs. I wonder if naming him Kenny was Parker and Stone's idea. After all, look what another Kenny goes through in South Park!
What makes this work, unlike Epic Movie, Meet The Spartans, Date Movie and such, is that it's not movie specific. Baseketball targets the sport movie genre, then crams in as many jokes as it can. Recent so-called parody movies seem to think selecting one movie to spoof, then adding other things in will work. It doesn't. Of course it also helps if you can get writers to make your movie funny too!
Baseketball seems to have become a forgotten movie. I can't understand why. It's funnier than more recent parodies, and shows how good Parker and Stone can be in front of the camera.
It's a very funny movie and one that deserves to more well-known!