Will Ferrell has been criticized of late, for taking on some seriously, for lack of a better word, wrong movie roles.  I say wrong, because if you look at Ferrell’s most successful (and most-quoted) characters, they have all been created and developed by the man himself.  Look at Old School, Anchorman, and even his cameo in Wedding Crashers.  It’s seems pretty obvious to me that when those characters were written into the script, the writers created a stereotype and then let Ferrell run with it.  You have to believe that the key to comedy is not what’s actually written, but the ability to ad-lib and create genuine human moments without breaking character.  Will Ferrell is one of the kings in this category.

In his most recent flick, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, Ferrell returns to form after a string of miserable attempts at playing script-driven roles.  I mean, honestly, did anyone see Bewitched? Melinda and Melinda? Even Kicking & Screaming was awful, because Will tried to tone down his antics to achieve that PG rating, which ultimately made his act just plain awkward and forced.  I’m glad to see that he appears to be coming to grips with the fact that he needs to stick with ridiculous, in-your-face comedy.  Because, after all, the Will Ferrell we’ve all come to know and love is some shape or form of an idiot lacking self-control and/or a grip of reality.    

Ferrell plays an ego-centric NASCAR driver with two first names.  Evidently, this is where the movie actually is most accurate, in depicting the self-absorbed ignorant redneck racers of real-life NASCAR.  In one particular trademark scene, Ricky Bobby is sitting down to a long-prepared feast of fast-food, beer and dysfunction with his best friend and teammate Cal Naughton, Jr. (played brilliantly by John C. Reilly), his two sons Walker and Texas Ranger (affectionately referred to as T.R.) his trophy wife Carley (played by the serious piece of ass Leslie Bibb) and his old, falling apart father-in-law.  Trust me, the dialogue in the dinner scene brings out the retarded trucker in all of us.  Really makes me want to go back in time so I could not pay attention in school, drive recklessly, establish a distorted view of reality where I can do and say whatever I want, score a hot wife who I have no business being with, raise my kids to be egomaniacal, foul-mouthed little bastards and eat and drink the most rancid shit on Earth completely oblivious to health and hygiene all at once.  All my hopes, all my dreams.

Ricky Bobby is hysterical in the film, don’t get me wrong.  But Gary Cole, a.k.a. Ricky’s father Reese, a.k.a. Cotton McKnight, a.k.a. Bill Lumberg, easily steals the show.  A degenerate, alcoholic, pot-smoking father with empty advice and insane driving lessons (he convinces Ricky to drive “with the fear”, meaning in this case to drive with a live cougar in the passenger seat, which consequently gets Ricky Bobby mauled), Cole is the epitome of the parenting it appears all NASCAR drivers got, leading them to choose a life path of driving in a circle at over 150 mph.  I can’t forget to mention Sacha Baron Cohen’s (Da Ali G Show) character Jean Girard, the gay French driver who becomes Ricky’s teammate.  I have to say aside from Cohen’s uncanny ability to portray homosexuality, he was not as funny as I had hoped.  Although you really can’t go wrong in insulting the French. 

Bottom line: If you are a) a NASCAR driver, b) from south of the Mason-Dixon line, c) a gold-digging whore, or d) all of the above….you may or may not be offended by this movie.  For the rest of us normal folk, this movie is a hysterical and accurate depiction of what millions upon millions of people actually refer to as the “sport” of NASCAR.  In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt, “America is all about speed.  Hot, nasty, bad ass speed.”