The Benchwarmers

The Benchwarmers is Rob Schneider's one opportunity to play a serious actor, and it's a little unnerving at first to see him not make a fool of himself. Here, he's a stud, and even somewhat of a lady-killer. 

The Benchwarmers is marketed as a flick about three losers who get their Little League revenge, as adults. But in reality, Schneider plays a decent and hard-working guy; he's athletic, and somehow managed to marry Molly Sims, for Pete's sake.

Schneider's character, Gus, looks benevolently on Jon Heder (Clark), an adult paperboy--always wearing a ridiculous bike helmet--and David Spade (Richie), a video store clerk with a tomboy bowl-haircut. Once Schneider realizes the boys have never played ball, he quickly organizes them and starts pitching and hitting balls to them.

Soon, the old bullies from their school days--all grown-up now--start backing a conglomeration of Little League teams against the threesome. Of course, only Schneider can play baseball well, so it's essentially his ace pitching (striking out every batter) and hitting (homering on every cut)--that allow them to prevail, game after game.

One thing I couldn't quite figure out is the ages of the crew. Schneider is set up to be this older, wiser character. While Spade and Heder are established as young, 20-somethings. But the bullies Spade and Heder knew as children, are all played by guys who look 40. Spade is clearly 10 years older than Heder, even with the wig, so why not make the timeline work a little better? I guess it's not that important in this kind of movie.

 The Benchwarmers is a mindless, stupid, predictable comedy—produced by Adam Sandler’s Happy Madison studio. And though it is an assembly-line product, it manages to display the typical Sandler heart and spunk, and to deliver just enough mindless distraction to make you smile and forget your troubles. The movie is precisely what you think it’s going to be based on the package, an over-the-top, juvenile, silly, and unrealistic farce. It’s not art, and it’s not even that funny. But it is, exactly what I expected, and hey, I'm the fool who rented it. Grade: C-

Comments

[Darnell Lamb]

The professor also saw "The Benchwarmers" over the weekend and also graded it a C- for many of the same reasons you mentioned. Brother, it is a sad commentary when you can't decide who turned in a better acting performance -- Sean Salisbury or the #7 robot.

[Misti]

OK, have to agree. This was one of the worst movies I've ever seen. My friends and I nearly got kicked out of the movie theater in NYC because we were laughing during Rob's "serious" moments. I'd give it a D.