ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, April 20, 1996 TAG: 9604230051
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 12 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: MOVIE REVIEW
SOURCE: MIKE MAYO CORRESPONDENT
It's hard to tell exactly who is the target audience for "Celtic Pride."
Not sports fans. The "heroes" are a couple of bloated, overweight, middle-aged white guys whose obsession with sports has turned them into pathetic losers.
Not sports-movie fans. The basketball scenes are relatively unimportant to the story, and the athletes and coaches are portrayed self-indulgent, immature fools.
Perhaps, then, the film is made for people who actively hate sports and movies about sports. It will certainly reinforce their prejudices, but do they really want to see that?
In any case, Mike O'Hara (Daniel Stern) and Jimmy Flaherty (Dan Aykroyd) are rabid Boston Celtics fans, and Red Sox fans and Patriots fans and Bruins fans. As the Celtics go into the final games of the NBA championship against the Utah Jazz, Mike's wife, Carol, (Gail O'Grady) kicks him out because he's always such a pain when the Celtics lose. And it looks like that will happen because Utah guard Lewis Scott (Damon Wayans) is on a hot streak.
He's an obnoxious ball hog hated by everyone - including his teammates.
Mike and Jimmy meet him in a bar, get him drunk and carry him off to Jimmy's place. Why not just keep him there until the series is over?
It's difficult to find much humor in kidnapping. First-time director Tom De Cerchio manages to keep the material from being offensive, but he does it by making the characters so unattractive. Wayans is the only one who maintains any dignity, and that's only because his co-stars fare so poorly. The few jokes that work do so at the expense of the characters, giving the entire film an air of condescension.
Celtic Pride
*
A Hollywood Pictures release playing at the Salem Valley 8 and Valley View 6. 90 minutes. Rated PG-13 for subject matter, strong language.
LENGTH: Short : 44 linesby CNB