more misses than hits in the laughs department

Rating: 5/10 (20 April 2008)

The humor is broad and predictably predictable in "Balls of Fury," a low-grade, though admittedly good-natured, sports farce that elicits roughly one laugh for every five attempts at being funny (not a bad ration, I suppose, but not really high enough to make the movie worth seeing). The plot, which is barely worth detailing here, involves a has-been table tennis champion (Dan Fogler) hired by the F.B.I. to infiltrate a ping pong tournament (a literal "death match") being hosted by a notorious underworld kingpin (played to the hilt by the one and only Christopher Walken). George Lopez, James Hong, and Diedrich Bader ("The Drew Carey Show") round out the likable cast.
Despite a handful of laugh-out-loud moments and an air of genuine sweetness, there's no compelling reason to recommend "Balls of Fury," aside from Walken's campy performance, that is. My advice, therefore, would be to skip "Balls of Fury" altogether and re-watch "Airplane" or "Naked Gun" instead.