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Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
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| Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story | |
|---|---|
 Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story |
|
| Directed by | Rawson Marshall Thurber |
| Produced by | Stuart Cornfeld Ben Stiller |
| Written by | Rawson Marshall Thurber |
| Starring | Vince Vaughn Christine Taylor Ben Stiller Rip Torn |
| Music by | Theodore Shapiro |
| Cinematography | Jerzy Zielinski |
| Editing by | Allan E. Baumgarten |
| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
| Release date(s) |  June 18, 2004 |
| Running time | 92 min |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $20,000,000 |
| Official website | |
| All Movie Guide profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story is a 2004 comedy from 20th Century Fox, written and directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber and starring Vince Vaughn, Christine Taylor, Ben Stiller, and Rip Torn. The film focuses on a rivalry between the owners of "Average Joe's," a small gym, and Globo-Gym, a competing big-budget gym located across the street. Peter LaFleur (Vaughn), the owner of the smaller gym, has defaulted on his mortgage and enters a dodgeball tournament in an attempt to earn the money necessary to prevent his gym from being purchased by Globo-Gym. Globo-Gym enters a team in the tournament in an effort to ensure that Average Joe's gym fails.
Dodgeball received mixed reviews, with a 69% average rating on Rotten Tomatoes[1]. However, the film was largely a commercial success, grossing over $30 million in its first week and eventually grossed more than $114 million domestically.
Contents |
| Character | Portrayed by |
|---|---|
| Peter LaFleur | Vince Vaughn |
| Kate Veatch | Christine Taylor |
| White Goodman | Ben Stiller |
| Patches O'Houlihan | Rip Torn |
| Justin Redman | Justin Long |
| Gordon Pibb | Stephen Root |
| Owen | Joel Moore |
| Dwight Baumgarten | Chris Williams |
| Steve the Pirate | Alan Tudyk |
| Fran Stalinovskovichdavidovitchsky | Missi Pyle |
| Me'Shell Jones | Jamal Duff |
| Cotton McKnight | Gary Cole |
| Pepper Brooks | Jason Bateman |
| Young Patches O'Houlihan | Hank Azaria |
| Tournament Referee | Al Kaplon |
| Lance Armstrong | Himself |
| Chuck Norris | Himself |
| Dodgeball Chancellor | William Shatner |
| German Coach | David Hasselhoff |
| Amber | Julie Gonzalo |
| Derek | Trever O'Brien |
| Blade | Rusty Joiner |
| Lazer | Kevin Porter |
| Blazer | Brandon Molale |
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The plot summary in this article or section is too long compared to the rest of the article. Please edit the article to focus on discussing the work rather than merely reiterating the plot. |
Peter LaFleur (Vaughn) is the laid-back owner of Average Joes, a failing gym with a handful of loyal, but eccentric, members, including Steve the Pirate (Tudyk), Justin (Long), Gordon (Root), and employees Dwight (Williams) and Owen (Moore). His rival, White Goodman (Stiller), owner of the glamorous Globo-Gym located across the street, has purchased Average Joe's defaulted mortgage, meaning that Peter must raise $50,000 in 30 days in order to redeem the equity of redemption on the about-to-be-foreclosed mortgage, or else Goodman will successfully foreclose upon Average Joe's Gym and demolish it for a carpark. Working on this transaction is attorney Kate Veatch (Taylor), whom White attempts, and fails, to charm, although she and Peter develop a friendship despite her role in his business troubles. After various half-hearted attempts at money-raising fail, Gordon declares that they can win the money needed to pay the redemption costs by winning a dodgeball competition in Las Vegas, and begin to train to enter the tournament.
After spying on them, White thereby learns of their plans to enter the contest, and decides to enter it himself to make sure he gets Average Joe's gym, forming a super-powerful team. After they manage to enter the tournament by default (after their first opponents – a Girl Scout troop – are disqualified after failing a drugs test), they are approached by Patches O’Houlihan (Torn), a legendary but now wheelchair-bound dodgeball player who offers to train them. Despite possessing questionable and painful training methods (such as throwing wrenches at them), the team begin to steadily improve. Kate – herself a talented player – agrees to join their team after finally reaching her limit with White’s inept, arrogant attempts at courting her (including having her fired).
At the tournament, the team prove to be an underdog success who win over the audience. Despite numerous set-backs, Average Joes successfully make it through to the final, where they will face White’s team. The night beforehand, the team's confidence takes a severe hit when Patches is inadvertently killed in a freak accident. White meets with Peter and offers him one hundred thousand dollars to hand over the Average Joe's deed and forfeit the upcoming finals match. The team begins to drift apart, several are distracted away from the final, meaning that not enough players turn up to compete. Peter – his confidence shattered – seems to be about to desert his friends when he bumps into Lance Armstrong, who motivates him to return. He arrives just before the Average Joes are to be forfeited from the final, but a tie-breaking vote from judge Chuck Norris allows them to play. After a close final, the tournament comes down to a sudden-death playoff between White and Peter; inspired by a vision of the deceased Patches, a blindfolded Peter manages to dodge White’s shot and strike him, winning the match. Although White reveals that Peter did, in fact, sell the gym the night before, Peter replies by revealing that he had used the money to bet on Average Joes to win (at 50-to-1 odds), winning enough to buy a controlling stake in Globo-Gym (including Average Joes), thus buying White out. The movie ends with Average Joes’ going on to be a success, and White drowning his sorrows in junk food, becoming obese as a result.
- After his appearance in the film, Rip Torn became league commissioner on the third season of the TV series Extreme Dodgeball.
- Notable cameos include; Chuck Norris, Curtis Armstrong, David Hasselhoff, Lance Armstrong, William Shatner, and Twiggy the Water-Skiing Squirrel.
- Al Kaplon, a former American League umpire who was the head official, became the head referee for the 2008 revival of American Gladiators.
- The rivalry between the Average Joes and the Purple Cobras is a reference to that between the Joes and Cobras from G.I. Joe.
- When White is knocked to the floor in the final match, Cotton McKnight's call of "Down goes Goodman, down goes Goodman!" is a reference to Howard Cosell's famous call of "Down goes Frazier, down goes Frazier!" in the 1973 heavyweight boxing title fight between Joe Frazier and George Foreman. He also says "Do you believe in unlikelihoods?" which is a reference to the famous call of the 1980 "Miracle on Ice" where Al Michaels screams "Do you believe in miracles?"
- Thurber states that he based the red and yellow colors of the Average Joes' uniforms on those worn by Hickory High School in the film Hoosiers.
- Christine Taylor and Ben Stiller are married and have two children; this is their second film together. Their first film was Zoolander.
- The treasure chest has the words Deus ex machina written on it.
- While in the hotel room, Ben Stiller's character puts out a cigarette that has been lit on the wrong end.
- The fictional publication mentioned in the movie, "Obscure Sports Quarterly," has spawned a website of the same name. See [[2]].
Critics were quite divided on their reviews for Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story. Slant Magazine dismissed the movie as "a less-than-one-joke film" [3] while TV Guide remarked that Ben Stiller "doesn't know when to stop." [4] Other critics, such as the Boston Globe praised Stiller's satiric take on male virility and praised the chemistry between Vince Vaughn and Christine Taylor. [5]
Despite the mixed reviews, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story proved to be a large success upon its release. In its first week, the film grossed over $30 million, eventually grossing a domestic total of $114,324,072. [6]
- 2005. Won BMI Film Music Award, Theodore Shapiro
- 2004 Nominated ESPY Best Sports Movie
- Won MTV Movie Award Best Villain, Ben Stiller
- 2005 Nominated MTV Movie Awards
- Best Comedic Performance: Ben Stiller
- Best On-Screen Team: Vince Vaughn, Christine Taylor, Justin Long, Alan Tudyk, Stephen Root, Joel Moore, Chris Williams
- 2005 Nominated Razzie Award Worst Actor: Ben Stiller (Also for Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004), Along Came Polly (2004), Envy (2004) and Starsky & Hutch (2004).)
- Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story at the Internet Movie Database
- Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story at Rotten Tomatoes
- Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story at Box Office Mojo
| Preceded by Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban |
Box office number-one films of 2004 (USA) June 20, 2004 |
Succeeded by Fahrenheit 9/11 |