Review of Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (2006) by Jc E — 27 Dec 2011

This is one of those movies that you probably need to be somewhat inebriated to enjoy ? which is pretty characteristic of most movies featuring Will Ferrell (Megamind). The first time I saw it, I was totally excited for some hardcore bashing of NASCAR.

What I got was an overhyped, extremely long-running SNL skit. There were a few little moments of wit, but nothing that was truly memorable. And, not to spoil anything for those fortunate enough not to have viewed it yet, the end, ahem, embrace, was truly disturbing.

However, time heals some wounds, and this second time around, there was more to appreciate. Amy Adams (The Fighter) and Molly Shannon (Bad Teacher) are comedic gold in their few scenes on screen. Jane Lynch (Paul) is almost unrecognizable outside her standard ?Glee? tracksuit, but is quite humorous.

Leslie Bibb (Iron Man 2) is quite funny as the trophy wife, and the two boys, played by Houston Tumlin and Grayson Russell, have some of the more memorable, albeit slap-worthy lines in the show. As for Farrell, he?s up to his same, too-much-of-a-mediocre-thing tricks.

His gags run well for a while, but once it goes past the standard run time for an ?SNL? skit, it wears thin quickly. John C. Reilly (Cedar Rapids) and Sasha Baron Cohen (Bruno) don?t help. Their characters are so over the top that they make the film feel like it has three times the Ferrell factor.

Overall, the film misses an opportunity to really mock NASCAR and sports dramas the way ?Walk Hard? squarely mocked the musical biopic genre. Basically, it boils down the Ferrell. Whenever he?s the lead, the film suffers from his ostentatious presence.