It's product placement-rific!!!

Rating: 8/10 (20 August 2006)

A fun(or maybe not-so-fun)game to play when watching this film would be trying to list all of the product placements or ads that are inserted very cleverly into this film. I realize that NASCAR,through which this movie uses for its setting and framing,is rife with advertising(actually,name me a pro sport that ISN'T!),but still,this movie even adds on to the amount of commercials given that fact.
Now,about the movie: race-car driver Ricky Bobby(Will Ferrell,who has it in fifth-gear here,pun apt and somewhat intended)has wanted to "go fast" and "be first" practically his whole life. He's born to a race-car driving daddy(GAry Cole,who's fantastic here)and,in fact,he is actually given birth to IN the car his daddy is racing to get his mama to get to the hospital. So to say racing is in his blood would be somewhat of a polite understatement.
HIs meteoric rise to NASCAR stardom is one that starts as a pit crew member who fills in for the decidedly UN-successful driver who quits in the middle of a race to relieve himself(and get lunch,of course),races the team back to respectability,and then goes on to greatness himself,with the help of his loyal if perhaps dense buddy Cal Naughton Jr.(John C.Reilly,fantastic here!)and the steady leadership of his pit crew chief Lucius(Michael Clarke Duncan,game in the role). This nets Ricky,over time,a hot wife(Leslie Bibb,doing more than she has to here),two bratty sons(Houston Tumlin and Grayson Russell),more money than he probably ever really needed and the inflated head of someone who KNOWS he's successful. That all starts to tumble when a predatory,snotty French Formula One racer named Jean Girard(Sach Baron Cohen,doing one of ze moost outrageous Franch accents zees side of Monty Python!)steps onto Ricky's territory and is promptly brought on by the racing team for which Ricky is the star. After an accident that leads to a mental breakdown,Jean becomes the lead racer of the team. Soon,Ricky's world starts unraveling,and he finds himself in need of reconnecting to just what it was that made him the great race-car driver he was. He'll need the help of his no-nonsense mom(Jane Lynch,unrecognizable),his former assistant(Amy Adams,fetching and not a bit overpowering) and,of course,his delinquent dad,who seems to come and go in Ricky's life like the wind.
As was with Anchorman,Wedding Crashers and You,Me and Dupree,this is a comedy that sets you up for about an hour or so of raucous humor before then sticking' ya with the emotive,heartfelt sap. Director Adam McKay(who also was behind Anchorman)knows a formula that wins when he sees it,and this one does. Plenty of cultural sub-referencing(from celebrity cameos and music of the 70s and 80s)and reliable comic foils(Molly Shannon as the racing owner's wife,Andy Richter as Girard's husband,David Koechnner as one of Ricky's pit crew among them)in minor roles,added to Ferrell and Reilly's improv-to-script(Ferrell co-wrote this with McKAy) performing make this film an easy sell for people who've already bought into the "Frat pack" type of movie for summer. It,like previous Ferrell efforts have made me laugh out loud and hard on numerous occasions. And while I can understand(and even be put off by it to some degrees)the amount of mapped skill behind movies like this,I have to appreciate it for the kind of summer movie it is: a no-brainer that appeals to one's weirder,more base self.
Anyone who likes this type of film will not be disappointed,and those who find Ferrell's antics annoying can(And probably has)avoid it.And anybody who gets distracted by stupid stuff in movies like product placements can sit back and count the ad placements.