Sports bush leagues are populated by a few bright shining prospects and plenty of has-beens and never-weres, guys who go on playing games to prolong their adolescence. Their boozing, bimbos, bus rides and brawls provide stranger-than-fiction moments that have inspired the winning comedies Bull Durham, Slap Shot and now Semi-Pro.
Set in 1976, the movie centers on the American Basketball Association, when a lucrative merger with the more powerful National Basketball Association is just around the corner for the league’s four most successful franchises — and extinction for the rest.
That’s fine with most of the league’s take-the-money-and-run also-rans, but not for Jackie Moon (Will Ferrell, so hot he could spot Hollywood’s other comedy kings the H-O-R and beat ’em in a game of Horse). As owner of ABA doormats the Flint Tropics — the ill-suited nickname that’s probably the result of a relocated franchise, a la the Utah Jazz or Memphis Grizzlies — Jackie made a promise to his sainted mother (Patti LaBelle) to keep the team alive.
Money isn’t a major motivator for Jackie, who had a white-guy soul hit called “Love Me Sexy” that financed his basketball venture. Not that he has a lot of cash to throw around on his team.
Several real-life owners in the upstart ABA had deep pockets that they used to lure college superstars like Artis Gilmore, Julius Erving and Dan Issel away from the NBA. But the Tropics operate on a shoestring, more along the lines of the minor-league CBA. Jackie, in addition to being the owner, is the general manager, coach, starting power forward and promotions director, and he’s not all that good at any of his jobs.
For one halftime stunt, he calls a lucky fan out of the sparsely populated stands for a 75-foot free throw at the opposite basket. When a drug-addled hippie knocks it in, Jackie looks for a loophole to avoid paying off. Then there’s Corn Dog Night, where every fan gets a tasty treat if the Tropics score 125 points. They’re improbably at 124 one night when Jackie realizes there are no dogs in the house, so he mugs a teammate to prevent him from scoring. The team scores anyway, so he runs a one-man fast break for the parking lot.
It’s genuinely funny stuff, in a Guy Movie sort of way, with rookie director Kent Alterman and screenwriter Scot Armstrong (a frequent Ferrell teammate) wisely keeping out of Will’s way. And the laughs rain down from the cheap seats during bits where Jackie wrestles a bear and at the card table over a surprise game of Russian roulette.
Jackie does take his merger protest seriously, finally eliciting a promise from the ABA commissioner (a perfectly cast Dave Koechner) that the top teams, rather than the preordained quartet, will join the rival league. Then the Tropics’ fortunes turn around when Jackie trades a washing machine for Monix (Woody Harrelson, lacing up his White Men Can’t Jump shoes to play a fast-fading guard who once won an NBA championship ring).
Monix OKs the trade because his old girlfriend, Lynn (Maura Tierney), lives in Flint. Her starstruck new boyfriend is thrilled when Monix shows up, and things get weird when he catches Monix and Lynn in the act.
Monix thinks the team has potential, and when he throws a tantrum after a listless loss, star forward Clarence “Coffee” Black (hip-hop star Andre Benjamin of OutKast) leads a coup that makes Monix the de facto coach. Soon the Tropics start winning, alarming the commish, who changes the merger terms to include a 2,000-per-game minimum home attendance.
There’s an obligatory Big Game, with LaBelle appearing in a vision to urge her son to use the revolutionary alley oop. But Semi-Pro isn’t about the X’s and O’s or W’s and L’s; it’s about the laughs. And it doesn’t require hoops nerdship to get a charge out of it.
Semi-Pro
★★★1/2
Stars: Will Ferrell, Woody Harrelson and Maura Tierney
Director: Kent Alterman
Rated: R for language and some sexual content
Theaters: Century Olympia, Galaxy Tacoma 6, Lakewood Cinema 15, Lakewood Towne Center, Lognston Place 14, Regal Martin Village, Yelm Cinema at Prairie Park