Semi-Pro (2008)

Jackie Moon, the owner-coach-player of the American Basketball Association's Flint Michigan Tropics, rallies his teammates to make their NBA dreams come true

Director:

Kent Alterman

Writer:

Scot Armstrong

Stars:

Will Ferrell, Woody Harrelson, André Benjamin

1 win & 4 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Will Ferrell	...	Jackie Moon
Woody Harrelson	...	Monix
André Benjamin	...	Clarence
Maura Tierney	...	Lynn
Andrew Daly	...	Dick Pepperfield
Will Arnett	...	Lou Redwood
Andy Richter	...	Bobby Dee
David Koechner	...	Commissioner
Rob Corddry	...	Kyle
Matt Walsh	...	Father Pat the Ref
Jackie Earle Haley	...	Dukes
DeRay Davis	...	Bee Bee Ellis
Josh Braaten	...	Twiggy Munson
Jay Phillips	...	Scootsie Double Day
Peter Cornell	...	Vakidis

Storyline

Three men, three dreams. It's 1976 in Flint, Michigan. Jackie Moon's American Basketball Association team languishes in last place, with few fans in the seats. Jackie dreams of a merger with the NBA. A tough-minded point guard named Monix is at the end of his career; he's played on the champion Celtics but accepts a trade to Flint to be close to Lynn, the love of his life. Clarence "Coffee" Brown dreams of stardom: he's the Tropics' best player, but he's a hotdog who doesn't value teamwork. When the trio learns that a merger is in the works that won't include the Tropics, they pull the team together to try to achieve the impossible. Can dreams come true in Flint?

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Plot Keywords:

nba | basketball | team | flint michigan | merger | 

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Taglines:

Putting the funk into the dunk.

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Genres:

Comedy | Sport

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for language and some sexual content

Details

Official Sites:

New Line Cinema [us]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

29 February 2008 (USA)

Also Known As:

Fél-profi

Filming Locations:

Santa Clarita, California, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend:

£774,698 (UK) (29 February 2008)

Gross:

$33,472,850 (USA) (25 April 2008)

Company Credits

Production Co:

New Line Cinema, Mosaic Media Group, Donners' Company

Technical Specs

Runtime:

91 min 98 min (unrated DVD) 99 min (unrated)

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital DTS SDDS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Will Ferrell has stated that this would be his last sports-related comedy.

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Goofs

Although the movie is set in the 1970s, many people in the crowd at various games are wearing current fashions, like hipster jeans and contemporary sports jerseys. This is most noticeable when the bear escapes and everyone in the crowd rushes to exit the stadium.

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Quotes

Lynn: You think I've forgotten that you cheated on me twice?
Monix: I only cheated on you once. There just had to be two women.

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Crazy Credits

At the end of the credits, Will Ferrell's voice can be heard calling, "Precious? Here Dewey."

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Connections

References Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny (2006)

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Soundtracks

"Never, Never Gonna Give You Up"
Written and Performed by Barry White
Courtesy of The Island Def Jam Music Group
Under license from Universal Music Enterprises

User Reviews

Watchable but just not among the best recent sport comedies.

Sport comedies recently really have become popular again, with movies such as "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story", "Blades of Glory", "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby" and "Balls of Fury". Some of them are great while others are just pretty lame. I'm afraid this movie is one of the latter ones.

It's so easy to make fun of the '70's in comedies. This movie uses basically all of the clichés existing regarding the '70's. The movie comically only mainly purely relies on the fact that it is being set on the '70's. It relies a bit too much on it, since it alone just not enough to make a good and funny comedy with. It's also getting a bit old, comedies that are making fun of the '70's. Writer Scot Armstrong also already did it before for the movie "Starsky & Hutch", which worked out still much better. Yes, of course it has some moments but it's one of those movies that has more misses than hits comedy-wise.

But a bigger problem is perhaps the movie its story. It's such a simplistic, weak and formulaic written movie. It's also as if the story is being completely forgotten at times and the movie only serves as a medium for Will Ferrell to deliver as many funny moments as possible. Perhaps this is also due to the fact that Kent Alterman is still unexperienced as a director and this was actually his first directing job for a motion picture. He used to work before with Ferrell as an executive producer on the movie "Elf".

Still it's Will Ferrell who keeps the movie watchable and mostly fun to watch. This is a real Will Ferrell movie, which however also means that all of the other characters and actors are being pushed completely to the background. Even actors such as Woody Harrelson and Maura Tierney. Yes, they are in the movie but the movie basically would had been just as good with other, less known, actors in their roles, since this movie really basically is all about Will Ferrell. What's even the point of their roles really? So in a way Ferrell is both a strong as well as a weak point of the movie. Still of course the movie remains perfectly watchable for the fans of him.

It has entertainment value but not really a sport comedy I would recommend.

5/10

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