Guest Author - Lauren Evans

Director: Adam McKay
Stars: Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Gary Cole
MPAA: PG-13
BBFC: 12A
My rating: 7/10
If you liked this, you�ll like: Anchorman, Mr Deeds, Blades of Glory.

As a Brit, prior to watching Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, I had a fairly shaky understanding of what NASCAR was, so for my fellow unenlightened Europeans, it�s like Formula 1 but with road cars and oval tracks, and considered by some to be a sport that only rednecks could enjoy.

Ricky Bobby (Will Ferrell) is a pretty dumb guy. Born in the back seat of his father�s car, his mother Lucy raises him, and once every ten years or so he sees his alcoholic father Reese, a semi-pro racer and �amateur tattooist�. Ricky idolises his father, and clings to the motto his father leaves him with after his school�s careers day � �If you�re not first, you�re last�. Ricky gets a lucky break which begins his racing career, and finds he has a natural ability for going fast and winning races.

At the peak of his career, he seems to have it all, his childhood best friend Cal (John C. Reilly), a hot wife, two cookie-cutter brats, crazed fans, a beautiful house and a garage full of cars. One day, French ex-Formula One driver Jean Girard (Sacha Baron Cohen) comes to America to challenge the invincible Ricky Bobby, and this sparks a chain of events that leads to his ultimate ruin. His father comes back into his life, and through one of the most unlikely training montages you will ever see, Ricky seeks to regain his rightful place at the top of the NASCAR tree.

Talladega Nights is packed full of Ferrell�s trademark silliness, and Sacha Baron Cohen (a.k.a Borat and Ali. G.) turns in a memorable, if familiar performance as a gay European dude with a ridiculous accent (think John Turturro in Mr Deeds crossed with Steve Martin�s Clouseau in the new Pink Panther). Sadly, Talladega has too many illogical plot twists to convince the audience of the characters or the story. While it�s definitely enjoyable and has some laugh out loud moments, it feels very much like a by-the-numbers sports comedy, and there�s a whole lot of miss among the hits. The film doesn�t attempt to deviate from a usual suspects style line-up of silly stereotypes, of NASCAR racers, gold-digger wives, rednecks, French people and corporate types. None of the characters in the movie are particularly pleasant or realistic, so as a viewer it�s very hard to care about the outcome of the movie at all.

Perhaps you need to be more familiar with the reputation, fans and TV coverage of NASCAR to get some of the satire going on here, but overall, I found this slightly disappointing. If you�ve watched Anchorman and Blades of Glory to death, this will help you kill some time until the next Will Ferrell sports outing, but don�t bother giving it a spot in your Netflix queue otherwise.