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Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
EMAILPRINT20th Century Fox Film Corporation

Mixed or average reviews
Based on 34 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 94 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Comedy
Written by: Rawson Marshall Thurber
Directed by: Rawson Marshall Thurber
Release Date:
Theatrical: June 18, 2004
DVD: December 7, 2004
Running Time: 96 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for rude and sexual humor, and language
Starring Vince Vaughn, Christine Taylor, Ben Stiller, Rip Torn, Justin Long, Stephen Root, Joel Moore, and Chris Williams
A group of friends from Average Joe's agrees to compete in a high-stakes dodgeball competition in Las Vegas in an attempt to save their gym from takeover by the national chain Globo Gym.
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Premiere Peter Debruge
Take it from someone who can still feel the hollow rubber tang! of old dodgeball scars: It feels great to be blindsided by a little movie like this.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
If you hold a perverse soft spot in your heart for straight-to-video underdog junk like "Ski School," you're going to love Dodgeball.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
Hilariously fake and rude. And thus true and tonic, if you know what I mean.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Ed Park
Dodgeball is the most satisfying comedy of the past year--at least among the ones starring Stiller.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
Pointed and satiric. Best of all, one must hasten to admit, it's pretty funny.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Wesley Morris
Ben Stiller is like a guy on the 1919 White Sox. He's rigged to lose. His comedy is the stuff of failure, and sometimes it's pleasurable watching him flit around in funny get-ups, only to have a pretty costar put him down.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
A blistering satire of feel-good sports movies, this film makes its mark via the most direct route: it lampoons by adopting the tried-and-true "straight" formula and tweaking it a little.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
In a miraculous gift to the audience, 20th Century-Fox does not reveal all of the best gags in its trailer.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jack Mathews
There are some clunky, juvenile jokes and an excess of shots to that special place on men that make us double over and weep. But there are some very funny, very hip jokes as well.
Read Full Review >Variety Joe Leydon
Gleefully commingles slapstick and scatology, satire and sentiment, in a free-wheeling farce aimed at making auds laugh until they're thoroughly ashamed of themselves.
Read Full Review >Dallas Observer Luke Y. Thompson
Writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber (the short "Terry Tate: Office Linebacker") keeps the jokes coming fast and furious, and while none of them are deep, many find their mark.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
It may not be original, but it's often shamelessly funny and more clever than I expected. Not much, mind you, but enough to catch me off guard with a few surprise throws.
Read Full Review >USA Today Mike Clark
Coach Torn adds to a palpably violent undertone by heaving wrenches at their heads and crotches, making The Three Stooges' poking and slapping look downright tame.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Stephen Holden
Nobody eviscerates the scary depths of male narcissism with such ferocity, and it is a huge relief to find Mr. Stiller flexing his oiled, low-comedy triceps with such vengeful glee.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
Mostly, Dodgeball just feels off--never consistently funny, but also never dire. It's as if Thurber resigned himself to making a dumb, formula-bound movie with a dusting of smart gags instead of a smart movie in dumb-movie clothes.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
It's coarse, primitive, regressive, often very stupid, and sometimes, against all odds, really a hoot.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
In outline, the story is pretty funny, and the film's outlandish takes on sports-movie conventions deliver some laughs. But Thurber chooses the low road to those laughs so often that he undermines his own satirical design. His actors certainly deliver amusing, spirited performances, but again, they get done in by relentless adolescent humor.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marrit Ingman
There's a place in life for movies like this goofy and lowbrow but never truly icky; the good guys are lovable losers and the bad guys have frosted feathered hair and unitards with inflatable codpieces.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Yes, the movie's watchable, and there are about six good laughs in it, but six good (not great) laughs in 90 minutes is pretty paltry for a comedy.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
As the WWF-style villain, Stiller misfires again and again, but Vaughn is reliably funny and Rip Torn has a great part as the underdogs' crotchety old coach.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey
Much of Dodgeball feels competent but lazy. The nerds are barely distinguishable, except for one who thinks he's a pirate and says arghh a lot to no humorous effect.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
The movie veers from cleverness to crass stupidity. You can never tell whether the next scene will induce loud laughter or contempt; for me, Dodgeball divided right down the middle.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
In Dodgeball, Vaughn is stuck playing the straight man to a collection of stooges, and he looks utterly bored doing it.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Robert Abele
For a while, Vaughn's slobbo guy charm and Stiller's creepy Flash Gordon aesthetic are amusing, but it isn't long before Vaughn looks like a Bill Murray disciple trapped among circus freaks, and Stiller runs out of weirdo tricks.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Angel Cohn
Be warned: The end credits contain a particularly nauseating image you'll wish you could delete from memory.
Read Full Review >New York Post Megan Lehmann
Ben Stiller's overbearing schtick officially reaches its expiration date with the desperate and puerile Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Mark Caro
Stiller, a DodgeBall producer, is revealing an unfortunate craving for the cheese of his childhood.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer David Hiltbrand
Anyone with a sizable role in Dodgeball gets mired in the script's dissipated tone. Two of the climactic jokes involve "Happy Days" references. How tenuous is that?
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Stiller strives to be a wild and wacky villain, Vaughn endeavors to be a likable and average hero, and both fall flat on their faces, like everything else in this unspeakably stupid comedy.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 7.1 (out of 10) based on 94 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Rodrigo D gave it a0:
Probably the worst movie I have ever seen.
STFUMETA gave it a10:
Funny, crazy and entertaining. Anyone expecting tear-summoning acting or awe-inspiring plots needs to redefine their ideas of the comedy genre. It's funny and you can watch it over and over again. Simply fantastic.
John H gave it a10:
I would have given it a 0, but Chuck Norris would kill me.
Jay R gave it a10:
Simply the funniest film I have ever seen!
c h gave it a5:
Looking at both the user reviews, the professional reviews, and just from what I hear from my friends, Dodgeball is a very hit or miss movie. You either love it or you dont. Truth be told, I did not. This comedy is geared more towards the slapstick fans and not quite so much for the verbal bits. Since slapstick was never my thing, I sat through the entire movie with a blank face. What's sad is that the funniest bits of the movie were all put in the trailer, so there's really no reason to waste your time on this one.
Adam R. gave it a10:
Don't listen to metacritic this time. I was expecting it to be at least higher than 80. It should have been a hundred. !0 out of 10. Great movie!
Joel H gave it a5:
It's not a good movie...but it is very fun to watch. With a comedy, thats all I care about.
