Semi-Pro

After a winning run of nonsense comedies and brashly oblivious idiot characters, Will Ferrell appears to be simply running out the clock in this spoof of the short-lived American Basketball Association. He plays Jackie Moon, a disco celebrity who cashes in on his one hit and buys an ABA team in Flint, Mich. A kind of vanity sports project, he plays, coaches and masterminds tacky halftime shows and promotional gimmicks in order to hold on to his increasingly diminishing audience. It's pretty much a one-joke movie and his flailing team and the ABA in general are the butt of that joke, at least until the competition heats up as the team competes for a berth in the income-starved league's upcoming merger with the NBA. Woody Harrelson co-stars as the onetime NBA player who offers the squad something it hasn't seen in years (coaching and leadership), and André Benjamin is the star player, a flamboyant talent working in a professional vacuum. It's a lazy comedy that coasts on "Rocky" clichés of underdog triumphs and personal victories. Most of the laughs come from the ensemble improvisations of the supporting cast and side characters, notably the color commentary by team announcers Andrew Daly and Will Arnett and the wide-eyed enthusiasm of Andy Richter. Also available in Blu-ray format.

The film is offered in a bare-bones, single-disc edition and in a two-disc, unrated version with plenty of extras, but how many buyers are really all that interested in getting behind the scenes of this film? The special edition features both the R-rated theatrical cut and the extended, unrated version along with such supplements as deleted scenes (including an alternate "Where Are They Now?" ending narrated in Daly's spot-on sports announcer parody) and improvisation clips in the "From the Cutting Room" section. These are just the kind of thing Ferrell fans will enjoy, but do you really need to see the basketball training camp ("Recreating the ABA") or trace the origins of the film back to screenwriter Scot Armstrong and director Kent Alterman ("The Man Behind Semi-Pro")? As the old joke goes, I watch supplements so you don't have to, and there's not much essential material here. Except for maybe the Blu-ray exclusive "Super Agility Trainer," an interactive game with an uncanny resemblance to "Pong."