Polly Shannon in Men with Brooms (2002)

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A strange thing happened on the way to a funny movie.

Men With Brooms starts off as a marvelous parody-of-sports movie where the sincere losers re-unite and, playing with athletic purity and love of the game, triumph over all the slick hotshots who dominate the sport. You know, the whole Rocky , Karate Kid, Bull Durham, The Natural, Mystery Alaska kind of thing. From the beginning, it promised to do for curling what Blow Dry did for styling. Then, somewhere about 20 minutes into the movie, the filmmakers forgot where they were going with the comedy, and the film actually became a serious Rocky Balboa film with a romantic sub-plot.

Then, somewhere about 20 minutes into the movie, the filmmakers forgot where they were going with the comedy, and the film actually became a serious Rocky film with a romantic sub-plot.

When the film was being funny it was not bad at all, and even the serious parts are performed pretty well by some professionals like sexy-voiced Molly Parker. But there isn't much reason why I want to watch an uplifting movie about the triumph of the curling underdogs.

It includes several foolish sub-plots about everything from a romantic triangle to astronauts to a 400-pound man trying to collect a debt from one of the team members.

And it includes every single sports movie cliché, including the miracle finish, the prodigal son, the dead coach whose spirit lifts the team, the hard-eyed excessively professionalized opponent, and the team member who quits but shows up for the big game ... er ... match - or whatever they call a curling competition.

On the other hand, I have to say that it is a sweet, cute, harmless, watchable film about nice people. The director laid in some very creative visual compositions to portray the small town where they lived, and he actually managed to find the grace and poetry in curling. It ended up being the Field of Dreams of curling. I just wish it had held the edge it promised in the first few minutes.

Based on my limited experience, this is probably the Citizen Kane of curling movies. It was disappointing as a comedy, but I ended up charmed by it, almost against my will. C- as an inspirational sports film, C- as a comedy.

Nudity Report: No nudity in this flick, but Polly Shannon is in a bikini top and a G-string on a bed and Molly Parker can be seen in her bra 0:50 minutes in.

Critics Vote: Filmcritic.com 3/5.

IMDb Summary: IMDb voters score it 7.1/10.

Box Office: With their dollars: budget $7.5 million, USA gross $4 million, Canadian opening weekend - one million Canadian dollars.

DVD Info: widescreen anamorphic 1.85:1


Written by: Scoopy …courtesy of Scoopy.net