| Product: |
Blades of Glory (DVD) |
| Date: |
18.03.08 (106 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Wit, comedy and some great performances
Disadvantages: if you dont like stupid comedy then it may not be to your liking.
A comedy about two men who join together to form the first ever all male ice skating pairs team sounds like a crazy idea. In fact it is a ludicrous idea but some how or other it works just because of that, even though Will Ferrell is someone I cannot abide at all in a starring role.
Will Ferrell is Chaz Michael Michaels, the bad boy of mens figure skating, his routine are audacious, raunchy and border on the obscene, but the crowds love him.
Jon Heder is Jimmy MacElroy the boy wunderkind with his girly hair and near perfect dance routines when he is on the ice.
Macelroy and Michaels are the worst of opponents, they each hate what the other stands for and they way they perform their routines. At the start of the film both of them are competing for gold at a championship. A dead heat between the two gives them both gold and their dislike for each other spills over when they have to stand next to each other on the podium. A brawl starts and they both find themselves banned from competitive ice skating for life.
Three and a half years later Chazz is a performer in a kiddies icescapade type show, skating around in the costume of an evil wizard constantly drunk and Jimmy is working for a sporting goods store giving his advice on ice skating equipment.
All of a sudden Hector, Jimmy's obsessive stalker fan finds a loophole. Jimmy is only banned for life in his category... men's singles... he could skate again in pairs skating, if he can find a partner to skate with.
Unable to find anyone who will partner up with him another brainwave hits and it seems as if the only option he has is to pair up with Chazz. Strange as it seems there is no rule that says a pairs skating duo has to be of the same sex!
Will the pair get on this time around? Can they actually skate as a pair? How will their main rivals, the Van Waldenbergs, deal with these new challengers to their undisputed crown and will Chazz be able to control his addiction to sex?
All this and more will be discovered if you watch Blades of Glory, possibly the stupidest, silliest and funniest comedy I have seen for quite a while. Nothing since Little Miss Sunshine has made me laugh out loud as much as this. BOG is stupid, make no bones about it, but unlike most Will Ferrell films it is actually very very funny as well. Similar to Dodgeball it is the age old story of the underdogs fighting against all odds to win.
Like all sports films BOG has the traditional montage scene, unlike most of them though this not only advances the story but has you in stitches as well. The scenes of two macho males, well that might be pushing it a bit in Jimmy's case, dancing with each other, holding each other and executing moves that are really not designed for two men to perform should bring a smile to the face of even the most hardened anti Ferrell and American comedy cynic.
Still a film is not made by comedic scenes alone and what really pushes BOG into the stratosphere is the comic interplay between Jimmy and Chazz. The phone call between Jimmy and Katie Van Waldenberg (the sister of the ice skating champions) is as fine an example of wit, comedy and comic timing as you are ever likely to see. With the other Waldenbergs and Chazz both trying to offer advice to their respective 'friends'. All five participants make this a scene to remember.
There is also a fine, more or less cameo turn by Craig T Nelson (star of the US series The Coach) as Jimmy's skating coach. Nelson is another of many good American comedy actors who has never quite hit the big time in the movies but is always a joy to see on screen.
While not as completely stupid, or as funny, as Zoolander (my favourite stupid American comedy movie) BOG is a film to see, a comedy that will do more than make you laugh, it will have you rolling in the aisles, even if, like me, you cannot stand Ferrell.
Summary: A sporting comedy about ice skating
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