| 75 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Andy Spletzer
The reason Balls of Fury works as well as it does, aside from its low aspirations, is because of the charm of Fogler in the lead. Like Jack Black, but not as sarcastic, he brings a winning enthusiasm to the role.
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| 75 |
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Kamal AL-Solaylee
Stupendously silly but viciously funny.
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| 63 |
Boston Globe
Mark Feeney
The movie flaunts its ridiculousness and offers a relentless string of jokes about blindness, groin-bashing, and bodily odors.
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| 63 |
Chicago Sun-Times
The first movie combining Ping-Pong and kung-fu and co-starring Maggie Q. How many could there be?
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| 63 |
New York Daily News
If it's not quite the best Will Ferrell movie he never made, Balls of Fury is, at the very least, a lot funnier than it has a right to be.
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| 63 |
Philadelphia Inquirer
Even at just 90 minutes, Balls of Fury - with its caricatures of the Asian underworld, with its G-man malarkey and gay jokes (Feng keeps an all-boy bevy of sex slaves) - begins to outstay its welcome.
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| 60 |
The Hollywood Reporter
The good news is that Christopher Walken, resplendent in purple silk, isn't the film's sole redeeming element. The bad news is that even his arch-villain can't save Balls of Fury from losing bounce as the story proceeds.
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| 58 |
Portland Oregonian
Lisa Rose
The shtick grows a bit repetitive, so by the end of the story you may be checking the time rather than rooting for Randy.
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| 50 |
Premiere
Marilyn Smith
Ultimately even the strongest characters deliver mixed results.
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| 50 |
Chicago Reader
This is pretty thin soup, but the players are spirited and the jokes generally offbeat.
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| 50 |
Miami Herald
The few jokes it does land can't make this more than a look-what's-on-late-night-cable event.
|
| 50 |
Variety
Relentlessly silly in spoofing martial-arts movie conventions, Balls of Fury has roughly enough laughs for a first-class trailer but wheezes, gasps and finally goes flat through much of its 90 minutes.
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| 50 |
Los Angeles Times
A lifeless pingpong comedy that ricochets from one flat gag to the next.
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| 50 |
TV Guide
In the grand tradition of "Beerfest" and "Bladels of Glory," this insistently ludicrous -- and not entirely unfunny -- two-joke comedy satirizes an old Hollywood standby: the big-comeback sports movie.
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| 50 |
Baltimore Sun
Gene Seymour
As disposable as aluminum cans without the promise of a cash return.
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| 50 |
San Francisco Chronicle
The real trouble is that it's supposed to be an outrageous comedy, but in fact it's fairly tame and not all that funny.
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| 42 |
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Add Balls Of Fury to the list of movies that not even Walken's moon-man delivery and oddball comic energy can save.
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| 40 |
Washington Post
The nicest thing is the Asian American actress known as Maggie Q.
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| 40 |
Salon.com
Intended as nothing more than a here-today, gone-tomorrow zany entertainment, and at the very least, it has a good-natured, slightly raunchy spirit about it. But ultimately, it's a hollow enterprise, all ping and no pong. It doesn't bounce; it splats.
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| 38 |
USA Today
Balls of Fury makes "Dodgeball" look like high art. It'll be tough to crack a smile, let alone laugh, during this uninspired and sophomoric satire of sports movies.
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| 30 |
The New York Times
Raunchier and somewhat more imaginative than “Hot Rod.”
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| 30 |
Austin Chronicle
A mildly entertaining reworking of the Farrelly Brothers' superior micro-sport parody "Kingpin."
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| 30 |
LA Weekly
Nathan Lee
1. Balls of Fury is a movie about: a. A former table-tennis prodigy enlisted by the FBI to infiltrate the underground pingpong tournament of a legendary Chinese criminal. b. Suppository jokes.c. Little worth discussing and even less worth seeing.
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| 25 |
New York Post
Mostly unfunny, extremely silly pingpong comedy.
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| 0 |
Film Threat
Mark Bell
Steer clear of Balls of Fury for as long as you draw breath. Period.
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| 0 |
Entertainment Weekly
A joke of a title in search of a movie with a single good joke.
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