"Pepper needs new shorts." -- Dodgeball

I can't for the life of me remember why I waited more than a minute to do a review on this movie. It's probably too famous to spotlight, but then again, I'm not getting paid for this.

Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story tells the tale of a group of misfits beaten on by their physical superiors who fight back and, against all odds, win.

Ok, so it won't win awards for originality, but there's a surprising amount of fun to be had in such a stock premise. Although all the major plot points are easily foreseen, exactly how the characters go about fulfilling them is inventive and interesting. It's nearly impossible to say more without spoiling some of it, so I won't.

We start the film with Peter La Fleur, a loser who is almost as lazy as I feel right now. He doesn't pay his bills, doesn't return his rented videos, and owns a car and Average Joe's Gym, both of which are falling apart. The enemy: White Goodman, a fat-man-turned-fitness-freak. He owns a chain of gyms which focus of making their customers hate their bodies enough to work out a lot. Peter's gym is going to close unless he gets $50k within a month, so he and his loyal customers decide to play in a Vegas dodgeball tournament to get its convenient $50k cash prize, a tournament which Goodman decides to enter as well.

First and foremost, this movie delivers laughs by the boatload. Seriously, it's one of the funnier movies of 2004 at least, and probably of 2005 (so far) as well. A plethora of types of funny can here be found, with everything from cheap physical comedy to witty/not-so-witty repartee to even cheap physical comedy. The cameos, of which there are quite a few, truly add a lot to the movie. I could barely stop laughing long enough to breathe.

The dodgeball sequences were surprisingly well done. I don't spend a lot of time watching professional dodgeball, but they seemed fairly realistic, and they were certainly exciting.

Virtually every single character was extremely well acted. Vince Vaughn played his La Fleur perfectly; his half-deadpan, half-constant amusement mood just made very witty thing out of his mouth that much funnier. Ben Stiller's Goodman was suitably over-the-top. Christine Taylor's Veatch had just the perfect blend of blondeness, intelligence, and poise that placed Goodman into the funny kind of relief (made all the funnier when you learn that she and Stiller are married, or at the very least were during shooting). The Average Joe-ers are all pathetic and noble in turns; they have their geeky, lame foibles, but they also have their steel.

A word of warning, however: do not (I repeat: do NOT) sit through the credits, because at the end of them you will be subjected to a sight too horrible to describe. If you truly must learn what is there, be sure to go in on an empty tummy.

Action: 3/5 killer ceiling fixtures (It served its purpose quite adequately).
Acting: 4.5/5 flying wrenches (The acting was extremely good).
Humor: 5/5 towels (Funny funny funny. It's the only real reason, and a great reason it is, to see the movie).
Story: 3.5/5 wheelchairs (Again, it sufficed. Despite being very cliche, it managed to throw a few curveballs).
Sound: 2/5 S&M costumes (I never really noticed the music much).
Visuals: 3/5 broken cardboard cutouts (Nothing special here).

Overall (not necessarily determined by the above categories): 3.5/5 dodgeballs (See it to laugh uproariously, but there's not a whole lot other than that).