Balls of Fury

Rating: 3/10 (17 June 2010)

There are probably those that say that a little feature of the sport of table tennis, like in Forrest Gump, is as far as it will go, it's not exactly a game of football or golf, but it happened! Basically Randy Daytona used to be a champion Ping Pong pro when the game was made an official sport in 1988, but then his father is killed and he stops playing. Now grown up, Randy (Dan Fogler) can only make money doing hardly watched magic tricks involving his skill, but they may have some better use when he is met by FBI Agent Ernie Rodriguez (George Lopez). He is recruiting Randy for a secret mission to get close to Most Wanted fiend Feng (Christopher Walken), who is also responsible for the death of Randy's father. To get a bit more professional practise before seeing the villain, Randy gets some guidance from blind but wise Ping Pong expert Master Wong (James Hong), and is trained by his feisty daughter Maggie (Die Hard 4.0's Maggie Q). Eventually, Randy is ready to face Feng, entering his mysterious jungle compound and the most unique Ping Pong tournaments, facing fierce players, like old opponent Karl Wolfschtagg (Thomas Lennon). I admit that I dozed off about half-way through, and I woke up pretty much at the conclusion, where Feng is defeated in a final game of Ping Pong on an unstable rope bridge, and that's about it. Also starring Norbit's Terry Crews as Freddy, Robert Patrick as Sgt. Pete Daytona and Jason Scott Lee as Siu-Foo. Walken is an alright camp villain, if a little ridiculous, the Enter the Dragon inspired stuff is silly, and just the whole idea of basing a film around Ping Pong does seem very slippery, so it's a sports comedy flop for me. Adequate!