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'Bad News Bears': A kids movie kids shouldn't see

By ELEANOR RINGEL GILLESPIE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

More than the "The" has been dropped from "Bad News Bears," Richard Linklater's remake of the wonderful 1976 underdog comedy, starring Walter Matthau as Buttermaker, a grumpy old Little League coach, and Tatum O'Neal as Amanda, his star pitcher.

The sweetness is gone. The sense of unforced kid rowdiness. And, most crucially, due to a bad casting decision, the central relationship between the coach and his star player.

Paramount Pictures

'Bad News Bears'

C-

The verdict: Mostly bad news.

Director: Richard Linklater
Starring: Billy Bob Thornton, Greg Kinnear, Marcia Gay Harden, Timmy Deters, Sammi Kane Kraft
Run time: 111 minutes
Release date: July 22, 2005
Rating: PG-13 for rude behavior, language throughout, some sexuality and thematic elements.
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In their stead are Hooters girls, nonstop filthy language that really pushes the PG-13 envelope, cheesy sex jokes and a great big hole where the Buttermaker/Amanda story should be.

Billy Bob Thornton takes over as Buttermaker, an apathetic, foul-mouthed drunk who'd rather teach the kids how to mix martinis than hit a home run. So what we get is "Bad Santa" meets "The Bad News Bears." Unfortunately.

The plot pretty much follows the earlier version. The Bears go from worse to first (or close enough) when Buttermaker finally pulls it together — rather too quickly — and decides to really coach them.

The team also brings back kid characters from the first film. There's Engelberg (Brandon Craggs), the overweight, mouthy catcher; Tanner (Timmy Deter), the underweight scrappy shortstop; and Lupus (Tyler Patrick Jones), the shy little guy in left field. But there have been a few additions, such as a nerdy Armenian kid (Aman Johal), who really wants to be as all-American as everyone else, and a kid with attitude in a wheelchair (Troy Gentile), whom Buttermaker refers to as "a bronze medalist from the Special Olympics."

Most of the humor comes from trying to be as raunchy as possible. True, the 1976 picture wasn't exactly angelic, but the stuff here is cruder, cheaper, more obvious. For instance, the original team sponsor was Chico's Bail Bonds. Now it's Bo-Peep's Gentleman's Club, so a bunch of strippers in tight tops can attend the games. Actually, almost everything has been oversexualized. Amanda tells Buttermaker he "must've had a big one" because she can't see what else her mother saw in him.

As Amanda, Sammi Kraft is a nice-looking girl, a heckuva a baseball player — she can throw 70 mph pitches — and a lousy actor. And an actor is what's needed to make the movie work. O'Neal had already won an Oscar when she was cast.

Good actors do turn up in supporting roles. Marcia Gay Harden is a multitasking single mom who hires Buttermaker because the snobby Little League won't let these losers play the other teams (she also files a class action suit, a nice touch). Greg Kinnear is the coach of the league's best team and he's very convincing as the sort of nightmare-sports-parent who, if pushed too far, might kill someone.

For those of us who worship at the altar of Billy Bob, rest assured, he's as caustically likable, unpredictable and funny as ever. But he doesn't really do much with the part, except practice his schtick for "Bad Santa 2."

Linklater has rarely let us down. He's pulled off movies as diverse as "Before Sunset," "School of Rock" and "Waking Life." Yet there's nothing here to indicate this is his movie. It's too clumsy, too disinterested in the characters, too, well, mean.

Please note: Despite the PG-13 rating, kids young enough to play Little League — who, let's face it, are this film's target audience — are too young to see this picture. "Bad News Bears" is a conundrum: a kids movie that kids can't — or shouldn't — see.