Semi-Pro and The Eye, oh My!

Why bother reviewing a Will Ferrell film? By now everyone either hates the man or loves him, and nothing I say will sway you from your chosen path.

Personally I love the guy (although I hated Anchorman) and I enjoyed the heck out of this movie.

Ferell plays Jackie Moon, player/owner of the American Basketball Association's Flint Tropics, a team designated to fold  in the late '70's merger with the NBA.But if Moon can coerce his lackluster, last place team to finish fourth or better they still have a shot to join the NBA. If not, they're kaput.

Sophomoric jokes abound here, but so does a halfway decent plot of the standard sports-genre variety. Still who watches a Ferrell movie for the storyline? I laughed so hard during the mascara game I darn near peed my pants, and Love Me Sexy - brilliant!

And never mind that I was five when the '70's ended. Somehow I've still grown nostalgic for what looks like a fun decade, and so I got an extra kick from seeing the leisure suits and disco dancers.

3 stars out of 4, 80 out of 100 - if you have a childish sense of humor.

                                                  

The Eye is an American remake of a Hong Kong horror film. This version stars Jessica Alba as a blind woman who undergoes a cornea transplant that mysteriously grants her the ability to see the dead. She struggles to understand a horrific vision that plagues her and sets off to find the family of the  donor to come to terms with her personal curse.

The movie itself was well done and there was nothing cheesy or half-baked about the production itself. But there was also precious little that was original either. Zap this movie back to 1970 and it'd be a groundbreaking hit. In 2008 it's little more a retread of a hundred other horror plots.

There was also something that bothered me, something Lisa originally pointed out. The blind character is not a teacher, clerk, a phone operator, or God forbid disabled. Such everyday professions/classifications are apparently demeaning to the portrayal of the blind. Instead Alba is, of course, a popular and accomplished concert violinist with a vast and eclectic circle of friends and she is openly loved by all. This isn't the first time this phenomenon has shown up in Hollywood.

Why is it beneath a blind or disabled character to be portrayed as a normal, everyday person? Isn't that the point of equality in the first place? Being compelled to use them in such an elevated manner is just another form of bigotry, as if they 'need' special assistance in the script to be taken seriously by the audience.

What a crock.

2.0 stars out of 4, 50 out of 100. Ok, 55 out of 100 because you do, in fairness, get to look at Jessica Alba for ninety minutes.