LADN: Were you worried about how stupid this might look?įerrell: Knowing the context of the film, the stupider the better. Or unfairly trashing one of mankind's most beautiful displays of physical prowess or whatever it is they thought they were doing. We asked Hamilton, Ferrell, Heder and off-ice co-star Jenna Fischer (from TV's "The Office") about the hard work of making ice skating look silly. Respected ice choreographer Sarah Kawahara schooled the comic actors in skating moves, and the likes of Nancy Kerrigan, Sasha Cohen and Scott Hamilton make good-natured appearances in the film. Men's singles champs and mortal enemies Chazz Michael Michaels (Will Ferrell) and Jimmy MacElroy ("Napoleon Dynamite's" Jon Heder) get banned from competition for fighting on the ice, only to discover a loophole that allows them to resume skating as the first all-male pair.īut members of the skating establishment proved enthusiastically helpful. Blades of Glory is a so-so crossroads for both, but it’s a telltale sign of exactly what is wrong in this genre often enough.The film's idiotic premise seems sure to insult pros and fans alike.
Blades of Glory didn’t, and things would only get worse on this path once Semi-Pro and Mama’s Boy rolled around, which only prove my point: far too often do comedic performers get typecast to death in this day and age. It’s not a perfect film, but at least it tried something fresh. However, the film also tosses curveballs at you: moments of true tenderness and spirit that are contradictorily beautiful in a goofy space. To see what I mean, I can’t help but reflect on last year’s Eurovision, which also starred Ferrell, and also has enough of the same-old shtick to feel a bit redundant. A chicken can cross a road, a river, an astroid belt, or a canyon in hell: it’s still the same damn joke. We’re not transported to a new environment. Very little service to any of the stars here, let alone the two names on the film’s poster, which promises something much more. What transpires is a comedy that struggles under the weight of its leads, who have been provided no support outside of one cue: “do that funny thing you did before, but again”. However, Blades of Glory doesn’t care for that.
You can expect some hijinks and industry-relevant jokes. They’ll do whatever it takes to earn their gold medals again, even if it’s moves that could actually kill them. The story itself seems okay: two disgraced single figure skaters have now decided to compete at the Olympics - after losing their hard earned medals - as a set of partners.
Too many jokes feel forced or expected at this point, and none of the film feels like it matters outside of you watching the picture for this dynamic duo (or the other funny cast members, like then-couple Will Arnett and Amy Poehler, Jenna Fischer on her career rise, and others). The end result is a decent sports comedy that is made to be slightly annoying. Put the two together, and you get a figure skating film that tries to tick off all of the boxes of the previous Ferrell films, whilst tossing in Napoleon Dynamite (that’s exactly why Heder was cast, let’s not kid ourselves) to see how he could flounder. Then there’s Jon Heder, who had a career jumpstart with the indie cult classic Napoleon Dynamite three years earlier, but he was finding himself pigeonholed as the same stereotype of cringe-inducing introvert, so that naturally followed into this film as well. Will Ferrell was coming off the super hot heels of Anchorman and the really funny aftermath of Talladega Nights, when it was apparent that his loud-voiced parade of unintelligible thought routine was here to stay he had used this tactic before, but now he was in leading roles, and the films would revolve around this very basic recipe (which he never did quite as well as his Ron Burgundy days also shoutout to his Alex Trebek gag on Saturday Night Live, which I still adore). By 2007, Blades of Glory was already setting itself up to be a beaten dead horse, well beyond any signs of life or energy.