Short cut via the short bus...

Rating: 10/10 (17 July 2014)

Brian Cox as the unrepentant gambling uncle almost steals the show in THE RINGER, but Johnny Knoxville hops aboard the short bus to success when he agrees to fix the Special Olympics. THE RINGER is often laugh-out-loud hilarious (as when Knoxville discovers that his undercover name will henceforth be "Jeffy Dahmer"), but it's also a nice little love story and- most important of all- a reaffirmation of the Human Spirit. I LOVE the fact that the guys with whom "Jeffy" is rooming not only find him out (when he lets his guard down and "acts different"), but also agree to help him perpetrate his fraud because they can't stand the star of the Special Olympics, Jimmy (who arrives in a limo with a gaggle of publicity people), who is favored to win again this year. On a personal note, I can sympathize with people who might be offended by some of the humor in THE RINGER, but it's actually relatively mild when compared to the kind of hurtful, humiliating humor that one encounters out in The Real World. (With LOVE, this one's for Sissy.)