Movie Review: Here Comes the Boom

Well I can safely say that I didn't see this one coming at all. Saturday night I was put into a predicament when the showing of Argo I had planned on going (I ended up going to a later showing, there should be a review up in the next couple of days) was sold out and there wasn't another showing for two hours. Using my luxury of having multiple friends that work at my local movie theater, I went and saw Here Comes the Boom as a time-waster. To my surprise, Here Comes the Boom was actually pretty damn enjoyable and entertaining. I laughed more in the first five minutes in the theater (I arrived when the movie was about 10-15 minutes in) than I expected to for the entire movie. The humor was pretty low-brow, but it worked for this type of movie. It also pretty effortlessly combines silly jokes with the underdog story formula. Clearly It's predictable and you know exactly what is going to happen at every point of the movie, but you will find yourself rooting for James's character the whole time. The entire movie's success thrives on the likability of Kevin James. James is the type of actor that just has such a likable and winning charisma in everything he does and is absolutely perfect for this type of role. It was great to see him in a solid movie after his recent string of misfires including The Dillemma and Zookeeper (In which he tried his best to elevate the weak material given to him, but it didn't work). The rest of the cast is almost as likable as James especially Henry Winkler as the eccentric music teacher/best friend of James's character and former UFC fighter Bas Rutten as James's character's trainer. The whole cast was clearly having a lot of fun in their roles and it shows in the infectiously good nature of the film. Here Comes the Boom is a surefire crowdpleaser for all ages (I can't remember the last time I had heard such an enthusiastic applause at the end of a movie) that blends ridiculous humor with underdog sports story and uplifting teacher story effortlessly. This is the most pleasantly surprising movie that I've seen in 2012 by far.

3.5/5 Stars