Waste of time

A waste of 90 minutes of my life

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Lovely film, just saw it on Netflix. Paul Kaye is a much underrated comedic actor. Great cameos. Not a contentious bone in its body. I particularly like the way it captures summer in a slightly grainy and slightly gray way. Exactly like a British summer. It goes through the usual plot contrivances you'd expect from what is essentially a sports film, with a sense of gentle satire. The villain of the piece is well cast, too. It feels like it was made around 20 years before it was, but that's not a bad thing. Don't expect it to rock your world, however. It's a very British comedy with swearing.

Blackball seemed like it might be worth a look, based on the on-screen plot description when I was looking through all the free premium channels offered on my satellite system last weekend. Last night we viewed it and found it to be an utter bore.This is the first movie I've ever seen that has any focus at all on lawn bowling, called "bowls." If you are like most of the people around the world and know little about this sport, after you see this film, you will still know little, but a tiny bit more than before. However, after being introduced to this sport by this movie, you are not likely to become a fan of it in any way.Paul Kaye's lead character, Cliff, was an obnoxious lout who possessed one of the foulest mouths I've ever seen on the screen, dropping F-bombs haphazardly into almost every conversation. While I don't care too much when foul language is used in appropriate situations, I do object to it being used for so many situations that it has virtually no meaning in the conversation. That is what Cliff and others do in this film.The most disturbing thing about Cliff is the stupidity he demonstrates. Supposedly determined to represent England in a competition against Australia, he works for some time to win a county championship that, somehow, will get him selected to represent England. Yet just as he accomplishes the goal, he commits an act of stupidity that the officials in charge not only decide is so egregious that he not only cannot be selected to represent England in the near future, but he is banned from all competition in bowls for 20 years.I can easily deal with a "hero" who has flaws, but Cliff is such a jerk that we viewers never are given any reason to want him to triumph. He is given a love interest and we don't see why the girl cares for him. He gets an American sports agent who manages to get the ban overturned and he is then chosen for the big match against Australia. He is to team in a doubles match with the father of his girlfriend, the longtime club champion who has never represented England, before, for reasons that were never satisfactorily explained.In the spirit of all of the worst sports movies ever filmed, the finishing scenes contain all of the expected cliché devices as we watch our "hero" attempt to win the big match. I endured it all for reasons I do not understand. My wife, the wiser of us, wisely fell asleep less than halfway through this film.The drama was utterly predictable, the laughs were almost totally missing and the reason for making such a dull movie is something I cannot explain. I don't think my negative impression has anything to do with my lack of expertise in lawn bowling because the rules are very much like curling, a sport I have enjoyed over a hundred times on TV and in person. I cannot give this a score higher than a 2.

Run of the mill sports comedy film. You've seen the plot before a thousand times, mega talented but unruly sportsman gets a crack at the big-time and a dull rom-com love interest sub-plot fills the gaps. The film has no build up or background it's just, bang, straight into the story from the first shot which seemed very odd. The main character played by Paul Kay is arrogant and annoying when, as he is the underdog, he really he should be endearing, this distroys the whole point of the film. But my main gripe is that film simply isn't funny, I barely raised a chuckle throughout the entire film. The film is a complete turkey. Even the brilliant Jonny Vegas couldn't save it. Avoid.

Lawn bowling. Chances are you may have never heard of it. I, on the other hand, happen to know a lot about it, thanks to my father being the two-time Canadian champion. I've been bowling a few times before, and even though I suck, it isn't all that bad a sport. When I heard about National Lampoon doing a spoof on lawn bowling, it was something I was pretty much obligated to see. Then again, National Lampoon hasn't made a really good movie since Christmas Vacation, so my expectations weren't very high. So, how well does Blackball roll? PLOT: 17/25: Cliff Starkley (Kaye) is a young punk in England who has taken a liking to the sport of lawn bowling, despite his over-the-top attitude. In fact, he is one of the best the sport has seen in a long time, aside from maybe current club professional Ray Speight (Cromwell). After winning the title from Speight, he is given a 15-year ban from tournament games because of writing an offensive message on the scorecard. After this, however, he develops a romance with Speight's daughter Kerry (Evans), who is tired of her father's obsession with bowls. He is also picked up by super agent Rick Schwartz (Vaughn), who finds loopholes in the ban and turns Starkley's wild approach to lawn bowling into a national phenomenon. The old club promoters, realizing how much they could get for bringing Starkley back, try to convince Speight to drop the ban.Meanwhile, celebrity status starts to get to Starkley's head, who begins to alienate himself from his grandfather (Cribbins), his best friend Trevor (Vegas) and Kerry.If you can say anything about the plot, it is original. The subject of lawn bowling isn't your general cannon fodder for comedies. Granted, the same type of plot has been done many times before, but this puts a new twist on it. Originality counts for a lot in comedies, so I'll be generous here.COMEDY: 4/25: I remember laughing maybe five times in the whole movie, and nothing really too funny. Most of the humour is derived from the general perception of the sport, such as the old age of the players (50 year olds are frequently called young) and the general etiquette of the lawn bowlers. However, the perception is off. As someone who has been to these places before, I can vouch that the players are mostly old, and my near-50 year old dad seems young by comparison. There are some young bowlers, but for the most part it is rare. But that is in Canada. In England, bowling is much bigger there and still draws a younger audience. Also, they only concentrate on the country club, saying that the others could never get a good green. Around the England area, there are plenty of other greens that are not for country clubs, but for the public.Just that the facts don't agree isn't a good reason to say the comedy sucks. The whole point is it is not a funny movie. I would be the type to laugh at this stuff, because I can identify with some of it, but it just isn't funny.ACTING: 11/25: The acting is pretty mediocre. Kaye may be the protagonist, but his acting ruins the movie. He tries to hard to be funny, but is such an jerk no one sympathises with him, which is necessary for the audience to like the movie. The fact he never gets his comeuppance annoyed me to no end.Vaughn (Old School) is just about as good for the role of Rick as anyone else in the universe. While he did a great job, I still can't help but think the script should have been better for him.The one standout good performance is from James Cromwell (Babe), who fits right into the deck shoes of a lawn bowler and keeps a professional look the whole way through. Even his bowling stance is good. The script isn't all there for him either, but he manages to make it work for the most part.The acting could have been better, but partly Vaughn and mostly Cromwell saved it from total disaster.ENTERTAINMENT: 6/25: If you don't know bowls, there is no reason at all to see this. If you do know bowls, I would only recommend it if you are really bored and have nothing better to do. Then again, most people who are into bowls aren't into National Lampoon, so this movie ends up being a major waste.TOTAL: 38%: This movie is a waste of time and money. It has few laughs, unrealistic bowling and a real jerk of a lead. Just avoid this movie unless you really need time to kill and are interested in bowls.