Ferrell saves “Kicking and Screaming” from mediocrity

Will Ferrell is a gifted comedian. How gifted is he? He is so gifted that he often takes mediocre material and turns it into gold (See varying sketches during his run on Saturday Night Live and his new film “Kicking and Screaming”).

Ba dum - bump, tsch!

O.K., so that wasn’t that funny, but it is the truth. When Ferrell was in the cheerleader sketches or the balding middle school teacher/musician sketches, the material wasn’t the best in the world but he wrung all the laughs he could out of it and looking back on his career at SNL, it is easy to realize that he belongs in the upper echelon of former members. Ferrell’s latest film, “Kicking and Screaming” is another example of him taking what would have been a lousy film starring anyone else and turning it into a fun day at the movies for the audience.

Ferrell plays Phil, the vitamin-selling milquetoast son of Buck Weston, a sporting goods store owning, soccer title winning, ultra competitive father, played with wonderful gusto by Robert Duvall. When Buck benches his own grandson and then trades him to the last place and now coachless Tigers, Phil takes the helm of the team with the help of Buck’s arch-enemy and next door neighbor Mike Ditka. The Tigers get a boost from two young Italians and Phil gets addicted to winning, so much so that he starts benching his son, yada, yada, yada. You get the point and you know exactly where this movie is going from the opening minutes. It’s still funny. In fact, at times it is hysterically funny and you can give Ferrell the lion share of the credit as he does much of the heavy lifting.

Aside from Ferrell, Duvall and Ditka, the rest of the cast features a motley crew of children that range from adorable and funny to creepy, weird and funny. Strangely enough, they actually looked like a real recreation league soccer team and not like a group of kids who do commercial acting and catalog modeling for a living. My favorite kid and the one who will steal the most hearts in the film is Byong Sun. the adopted son of a lesbian couple played by Laura Kightlinger and Rachael Harris (both former Daily Show correspondents). Byong Sun is tiny, shy and just a scream with the few lines he has. The kid who plays Mark Avery, the team comedian, also has some good moments and stands out from the crowd.

While “Kicking and Screaming” is no “Elf” or “Anchorman,” both of which had a lovable goofiness and odd sense of humor, it does have Ferrell giving it his all and making sure that every possible laugh is wrung out of what is kind of a cliched sports movie.

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