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.

Taglines:

• A True Underdog Story.
• Grab Life by the Ball.
• Grab Life by the Balls. (Australia and Europe)
• Go balls deep.

Contents 1 Cast 2 Plot 3 Reception 4 Original Ending 5 Teams 5.1 Teams shown playing at the Las Vegas International Dodgeball Open 5.2 Teams Mentioned but Not Shown 6 Humorous entities and elements featured in the screenplay 7 Cultural Refrences 8 Goofs 9 Trivia 9.1 Easter Eggs 10 External links

[edit] Cast

Character	Portrayed by
Peter LaFleur	Vince Vaughn
White Goodman	Ben Stiller
Kate Veatch	Christine Taylor
Patches O'Houlihan	Rip Torn
Justin Redman	Justin Long
Gordon Pibb	Stephen Root
Owen	Joel Moore
Dwight	Chris Williams
Steve (the Pirate)	Alan Tudyk
Fran Stella Noskovich Der Vinivisckvy	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
Blazer	Brandon Molale
Dodgeball Chancellor	William Shatner
German Coach/David Hasselhoff	Himself
Lance Armstrong	Himself
Chuck Norris	Himself
Joyce	Scarlett Chorvat
Amber	Julie Gonzalo
Number Double-Zero, Martha Johnstone	Lori Beth Denberg
Derek	Trever O'Brien

[edit] Plot

Peter LaFleur (Vaughn) is a financially struggling man who makes his money by running Average Joe's, a failing gym with only a few members. The members, Steve the Pirate, Justin, Gordan, Dwight and Owen, are heavily loyal to both the gym and its owner. Peter discovers that White Goodman (Stiller), owner of the glamorous Globo-Gym, has purchased Average Joe's defaulted mortgage. White Goodman makes it publicly known that he used to be obese but, miraculously, thanks to "working out", is now healthier than ever before, and, of course, completely non-obese. Peter must raise $50,000 in 30 days in order to redeem the equity of redemption on the about-to-be-foreclosed mortgage and remove the cloud on title to his gym. If he fails to do so, Goodman will successfully foreclose upon Average Joe's Gym and a parking structure will be built over the gym for Globo-Gym members. Working on this transaction is attorney Katherine (Taylor), whom White attempts, and fails, to charm Kate.

Back at Average Joe's, some money-making schemes are tried, including a car wash. These ultimately fail, although Gordon, after reading an advertisement in Obscure Sports Quarterly, concludes and declares that they can win the money needed to pay the redemption costs by winning a dodgeball competition in Las Vegas. Unbeknownst to the Average Joes, however, White has surreptitiously smuggled a spy camera in a cardboard cut-out of himself into Average Joe's Gym and thereby learns of their plans to enter the contest.

Peter and the other Average Joe's members initially face off against Girl Scout Troop 417 in a regional qualifying match and are quickly defeated due to their lack of experience with the game. However, before the troop can be announced as the winners, one of their players is revealed to have tested positive for steroids (and a low-grade beaver tranquilizer). Therefore, the troop is disqualified--and Average Joe's is deemed, technically, to have won the match, due to Troop 417's forfeit.

Afterward, the team goes out to celebrate but are interrupted by White and his newfound dodgeball team, who taunt the Average Joe's. Later, a dodgeball legend called Patches O' Houlihan (Torn) decides to coach the team using questionable and painful methods. Katherine watches and demonstrates excellent skill at the game, triggering the team to try and convince her to join. She declines, since she works for White and it would be a "conflict of interests". However, White visits her at her house and reveals that he got her fired so she would date him. She rejects his advances just as Peter arrives. A minor confrontation ensues and Katherine ends up hitting White. He leaves quickly, leaving Peter to try and convince Katherine to join their team again. This time she gladly accepts.

In Las Vegas the team are supposed to get new uniforms, but the orders get mixed up and they have to wear dominatrix clothing for their first match, since they have to wear matching uniforms according to dodgeball rules. They win largely due to Katherine and go onto the next round. The Purple Cobras (White's team) also win their matches with relative ease. At the semi-finals, Average Joe's is whittled down to Gordan, who isn't very good at dodgeball at all. However, he gets angry after seeing his wife flirting with a man in the crowd (Hasselhoff) and manages to defeat the other team single-handedly using the anger inside him, passing Average Joe's into the finals against the Purple Cobras.

The night beforehand, the team's confidence takes a severe hit when Patches is inadvertently killed in a freak accident when a "Luck Of The Irish" slot machine sign crushes him. Without their coach, the team starts to fall apart. 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. Peter leaves the hotel and runs into Steve the Pirate. Frustrated at White's actions, he grabs Steve by the collar and says, "you are not a pirate," thus depressing him and making him question who he is. Elsewhere, Owen sleeps with Fran, a member of the Purple Cobras whom he had been attracted to throughout the movie.

The day of the match, Justin is pulled away by a girl from his school (whom he has a crush on) to compete in a cheerleading competition because one of their members fell from the indoor rollercoaster ride and broke every bone in his body. Steve is nowhere to be seen and Peter also fails to show up, having checked out of his room before the others could find him. The team is worried they might have to forfeit due to lack of players. Justin returns after the cheerleading competition but Average Joe's still does not have enough players to play. We then see Peter drinking at a bar, miserable as can be. Suddenly, Lance Armstrong takes a seat next to him and inadvertently motivates him to return to the game and play. Peter returns to the match.

Just as the Average Joe's are about to forfeit, Peter arrives and it comes down to a vote to see if the Average Joe's are still eligible to play. A three person vote is then carried out and it comes down to a 1-1 vote. The camera pans over to the 3rd judge, Chuck Norris, who votes yes and allows the finals to begin. At one point, Justin is the last player to remain, although he recovers and manages to summon Peter and Katherine back into the game before being eliminated. Peter falls over and becomes a prime target, but Katherine takes the shot for him. As she is leaving the court, White purposefully throws another ball at her, resulting in a warning against him and, in a deleted scene, 10 seconds in the Shame Triangle. At the start-off, Peter manages to hit one of the two remaining Globo-Gym team members, but is hit by White. Luckily, White commits a double fault by stepping over the line on the throw, leading to a Sudden Death match between Peter and White. Peter blindfolds himself with a bandana that Patches had given him. He feels Patches' presence and manages to hit White sqaure in the face, scoring a victory for Average Joe's.

After initial celebration, it turns out that Peter did sell Average Joe's the night before, meaning that they would lose the gym anyway. Peter replies by revealing that he had bet on Average Joes to win (at 50-to-1 odds), meaning that he now had five million dollars to buy back his gym and buy out Globo-Gym. White protests angrily that he would never sell Globo-Gym, although Peter states that he will simply invest the money in a controlling stake of Globo-Gym, buying him out. And since Globo-Gym is a publicly traded company, White can't do anything to stop the sale. Steve returns, having cut his hair and changed his clothes. Peter convinces him that he is a pirate by showing him his "buried treasure", which overjoys Steve. Finally, Average Joe's goes on to become a success, while White returns to being obese and scoffs at the TV ad for Average Joe's stating "I should've won that tournament...fuckin' Chuck Norris".

[edit] Reception

Critics were quite divided on their reviews for Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story. Slant Magazine dismissed the movie as a "a less-than-one-joke film" [1] while TV Guide remarked that Ben Stiller "doesn't know when to stop." [2] 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. [3]

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 dollars, eventually grossing a domestic total of $114,324,072. [4] The film, along with the success of Will Ferrell's Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (which was also released that same summer), established the members of The Frat Pack as bankable stars who were able to create well-earning films.

[edit] Original Ending

In a DVD extra, director Rawson Marshall Thurber shows a joke "director's cut" with the movie ending in the Average Joes' defeat. In that version, the line of dialogue "They came here for absolutely nothing" was the last of the movie, immediately preceding the credits roll. Thurber states in the DVD commentary that, due to poor screen testing, the studio forced him to replace that ending with one mandated by the studio, which was the one seen in theaters. Thurber further states in the DVD commentary that he was so incensed by the studio's actions that he "left the film for a week," and that he continues to believe that depicting the defeat of the Average Joes was "the right way to end the movie." Thurber has also said that in the early drafts of the script, the Average Joes did lose, but the plot concept was "balanced" by one depicting Steve the Pirate returning from an absence with a large amount of money he had won at Treasure Island after a person driving through the Fremont Street Experience (That particular section of Fremont Street is closed to traffic in the real world), played by Thurber, told him to go back there.^{[citation needed]} Thurber's disapproval is further reinforced by the treasure chest filled with money that Peter wins saying "Deus Ex Machina" (literally: "God out of a machine") which is Latin for a nonsensical plot device used to resolve a story with no regard to its logic. In Greek theatre, actors portraying Olympian gods would literally descend on apparatus and dictate terms or events to resolve difficult situations, hence the pejorative term for contrived resolutions. Its purpose was to show how much the director disliked the new "happy" ending.

[edit] Teams

[edit] Teams shown playing at the Las Vegas International Dodgeball Open

• Average Joe's
• Globo Gym Purple Cobras
• Skillz That Killz, the inner-city champions for five years straight
• Lumberjacks
• Team Blitzkrieg, the European champions, led by David Hasselhoff
• Kamikazes, the Japanese champions
• Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department
• Poughkeepsie State Flying Cougars

[edit] Teams Mentioned but Not Shown

• MILFS
• Moose Knucklers
• Clown Punchers
• Mulchers
• She-Mullets
• Wedgies
• Yetis
• Pouncers

[edit] Humorous entities and elements featured in the screenplay

ESPN 8 ("The Ocho"): "If it's almost a sport, we've got it here!" This network is a jab at ESPN's growing empire of sports TV networks, which in 2004 numbered 5, not counting secondary services such as the Spanish-language "ESPN Deportes". In addition, the title is a reference to the nickname of "The Deuce" for ESPN2 when it first appeared. ESPN's family of networks and services currently totals well over eight, including ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNews, ESPNU, ESPN Classic, ESPN Deportes, ESPN Motion, ESPN 360 (which contains seven channels of its own), ESPN.com, and ESPN Radio. The montage immediately following the splashscreen depicts sporting events such as Squirrel Waterskiing and Flaming-ball soccer.

• The American Dodgeball Association of America: The sanctioning body for the sport who has laid down the rules as follows:
  • 6 players with one ball each; no gender specifications
  • Catching of the ball counts as a reversal (that is, the throwing player is out and another player on the catching team is allowed to come back on the field)
  • No stepping beyond the red line which cuts the field horizontally in half
  • Only ADAA balls can be used; personal balls are prohibited
  • Sudden death: If all players but one from each team are eliminated, and one commits a double fault, one player from both teams will participate in this overtime from two triangles facing each other. The first player to hit his opponent wins; catching is irrelevant. If a player were to step out of the triangle, that player would be disqualified.
  • All players on a team must wear matching uniforms.
  • Dyslexic players are not allowed on court.
• Obscure Sports Quarterly: A quarterly magazine which reports on obscure sports, such as Midget Tossing.
• The "Las Vegas University Learning Annex" is depicted as the host facility of the Las Vegas International Dodgeball Open
• Über American Films: The Film institute that produced and distributed the Dodgeball documentary from 1938.
• The film also makes several uses of double entendres:
  • Vaughn's character's name, Peter LaFleur, may be an homage to Montreal Canadiens forward Guy Lafleur.
  • "Go Balls Deep" is also a slang term referring to the practice of the most extensive penile-vaginal penetration possible during sexual intercourse, ostensibly in order to maximize the chance of conception occurring as a result.
  • The Joes hang out at a bar called "The Dirty Sanchez".
  • "Purple cobra" is also a slang term meaning "penis".

[edit] Cultural Refrences

• 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 unlikelyhoods?" 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.
• In the restaurant, when White Goodman says "Ball me!" meaning "Pass me a ball", the line may have been inspired by the way J.J Hunsucker would say "Match me!" to ask for a light in The Sweet Smell Of Success. Or, perhaps a reference to the popular phrase "Beer me."
• There is a reference to the poem Jabberwocky by Lewis Caroll, during the final match, in dialogue spoken by Gary Cole as "Cotton McKnight".
• After introducing "Blade" (played by Rusty Joiner), a member of his team who bears a striking resemblance to Val Kilmer, Blade clicks his teeth together in the manner of Iceman in Top Gun.

[edit] Goofs

• During an opening scene of the film, Stiller as White Goodman, during an opening monologue setting up Globo Gym makes reference to himself "six years ago". The subtitle reads, "White Goodman - 1987." This implies that the film is set in the year 1993. This is contradicted by a reference in a later scene. A message on Peter's answering machine mentions overdue DVD rentals, a technology that was not available for several more years after 1993. The message mentions the film Mona Lisa Smile, released over a decade later, in addition to a couple of titles that are very suggestive of productions of the pornography genre. In addition, Lance Armstrong refers to his "5 Tour De France victories", which clearly dates the film to 2004. Also, it is mentioned that ESPN8 presented obscure sports since 1999. Some of the sights in Las Vegas shown in the movie, like the Fremont Street Experience and Monte Carlo Resort and Casino did not exist back then (the Fremont Street Experience opened in 1995 and the Monte Carlo opened in 1996). It is also possible that the Globo Gym "commercial" was a re-run of one originally produced in 1993, rendering the point moot.
• In the sudden-death elimination round, when Vaughn as Peter LaFleur throws, Vaughn's left foot can be seen to have stepped out of the triangle.

[edit] Trivia

• The film relies most heavily on a thematic device known as Schadenfreude. A line of dialogue spoken by Gary Cole as the character "Cotton McKnight" in the film, even makes reference to the entire proceedings depicted as constituting "schadenfreude".
• After his appearance in the film, Rip Torn became league commissioner on the third season of the TV series Extreme Dodgeball.
• In the unrated edition, Peter La Fleur, Kate Veatch and her bisexual friend Joyce engage in group kissing after Average Joe's victory.
• Candice Michelle and Jen England, dodgeball dancers in the film, later qualified for the WWE Diva Search. Michelle was later eliminated from the 2004 Diva Search competition but became a diva for World Wrestling Entertainment anyway. England (dancer on the right side (facing from the camera) of the back row), meanwhile, made it to the finals of the 2006 Diva Search before being eliminated.
• At the end of the film's credits roll, there is an additional scene, during which Stiller, as the obese White Goodman character: (1) mutters a profanity constituting a comment on how Chuck Norris' vote influenced the outcome of the dodgeball match; and (2) proceeds to do a mysterious parody act accompanying a portion of Kelis' song "Milkshake" from the film soundtrack (which earlier appeared during the car-wash scene); and, (3) coughs while stuffing food into his mouth; and, (4) mutters something about "Pizza Bagels"; and, (5) makes reference to perceived intellectual deficiencies in the quality of the storylines of screenplays in the "American Cinema". These antics were also featured in the cinematic release of the film.
• Gary Cole (Cotton McKnight) and Christine Taylor (Kate Veatch) also starred together in two other movies: The Brady Bunch Movie and A Very Brady Sequel as "Mike Brady" and "Marcia Brady".
• This is the second film Ben Stiller has been in where his character is a crazed fitness/nutrition guru. He had a similar role in the film Heavyweights.
• At least five members of the cast also appeared on Arrested Development:
  • Jason Bateman (Pepper Brooks) starred as Michael Bluth
  • Ben Stiller (White Goodman) appeared as Tony Wonder in Good Grief, The Immaculate Election, Sword of Destiny, and S.O.B.s
  • Christine Taylor (Kate Veatch) appeared as Sally Sitwell in Burning Love and Out on a Limb
  • Gary Cole (Cotton McKnight) appeared as a CIA agent in Exit Strategy
  • Alan Tudyk (Steve the Pirate) appeared as Pastor Veal in Meat the Veals.

[edit] Easter Eggs

On the DVD "Special Features" menu, if the viewer 'scrolls' among the various selectable items using the appropriate buttons or options on the DVD playback equipment, the lettering denoting the various viewing options will alternately highlight. Press 'Enter', or 'Select', or the equivalent for your equipment. If the Easter Egg option is selected, a video clip containing Stiller, as the obese version of White Goodman, will appear, during which the obese White Goodman character instructs the viewer that if the viewer presses enter each time the White Goodman character snaps his fingers during the course of the movie (not the accompanying featurettes) the viewer will receive an Easter Egg. This is true. The selection of the appropriate button or option on the DVD playback equipment when the White Goodman character is seen to snap his fingers--not precisely when the character does, but 2 or 3 seconds thereafter--results in a short video clip being played. Apparently, this feature does not function with all types of DVD playback equipment, however.

[edit] External links

• Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story - official website
• 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