Balls Up
The laughs are deep but not balls to the wall with "Balls Up."
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I can’t say Peter Farrelly’s “Balls Out” (now streaming on Prime Video) is a good movie and I can’t in good conscience recommend it to y’all, but I’ll say it’s a marked improvement on Farrelly’s previous feature “Ricky Stanicky” and when I laughed (which wasn’t a ton … maybe five or six times in the 104-minute film) I laughed hard at some absolutely filthy jokes.
Brad (Mark Wahlberg) and Elijah (Paul Walter Hauser) work for their boss Burgess (a very funny Molly Shannon) at the Regal Blue Condom Company. Elijah has invented a new prophylactic that covers both the penis and the testicles and it’s up to Brad to sell it to Santos (a fun and game Benjamin Bratt) and the Brazilian World Cup delegation.
This would be a huge coup for Regal Blue as more condoms are used during the World Cup than any other event in the world.
The deal gets blown (no pun intended) when Brad and Elijah aid Santos in relapsing on his nine-year sobriety. As a result Regal Blue shutters and the lads are shitcanned from their jobs.
Brad and Elijah still receive airfare and tickets on behalf of Santos to attend the World Cup, but a drunken Elijah is goaded into reacting by a rival condom company’s Linguiça mascot during the game. Elijah charges the field with Brad in pursuit trying to stop him. Their on-field antics result in a blocked Brazil shot on goal costing the host nation the game.
All of Brazil now wants to kill Brad and Elijah whom they’ve dubbed, “Los Estupidos.” The guys’ only refuge is likely to come in the form of lawyer Antonia (Daneila Melchior) or drug dealer Pavio Curto (a wigged and accented Sacha Baron Cohen), who won a ton of money off their kerfuffle.
“Balls Up” as directed by Farrelly and scripted by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick (they’re the scribes behind the “Zombieland” and “Deadpool” franchises) feels like a movie that I would’ve watched on “USA Up All Night” as a kid. It’s dirty. It’s dumb. But it’s admittedly sort of fun. Wahlberg and Hauser have good chemistry and play well off of one another.
(I’m honestly surprised Wahlberg took part in this filth as he’s said he’s ashamed of being in “Boogie Nights.” Then again, “Boogie Nights” is Wahlberg’s best film and he’s a bit of a knucklehead.)
“Balls Up” is better than its trailer suggested, but also a reminder that Farrelly’s funniest comedies were made alongside his brother Bobby. Here’s hoping these siblings can collaborate once more. That’s the real GOOOAAAL!