Night of the Dribbler

Ha, what a bust this movie was! Before popping it in I was only aware of the awesome cover and title of the movie. You'd think Night of the Dribbler would be somewhat of a horror movie, right? Well you'd be dead f@ckin' wrong. This flick is nothing but a comedy. A very corny and lame comedy.

Night of the Dribbler revolves around a few silly things. A bet between two stupid deans, a story of confidence for the secretly talented equipment manager, a mystery of who the masked Dribbler is, and of course the zany antics of the Coach/Detective/Announcer of Fred Travalena. Mash all that stuff together and ya got the movie.

The movie as a whole isn't a complete total piece of crap, as it's horrendous in an so-so entertaining way. Ya got silly death scenes (one guy dunks a ball with two hands on a razor rim and gets his hands cut off), and the talented Fred Travalena (R.I.P.) occasionally succeeds with his in your face humor. But most of the time you're sitting there dumb-faced at all the lame jokes, and waiting for another scene with the Dribbler.

The scenes of basketball are pretty funny in a sh!tty way. That is if you actually like basketball. I love the game, so I find the ridiculously awful talent of everyone involved (besides the black dudes) to be pretty funny. The introduction scene before the game where all the players came out and were shooting bricks and air-balls was some good, stupid stuff.

But when it comes down to it, this movie's bad with a capital B. If you were foolish enough to think this was part horror, then think again. Only check this flick out if you love the round-ball or have a super duper ticklish funny bone, as this film shoots thousands of air-balls (jokes) at you.

I wasn't expecting much when I rented this,but thought I'd check it out,since I like Fred Travalena.I remember him from the late night talk shows and thought he was the next Rich Little.He plays 3 roles in this and tries to be funny,but it doesn't work most of the time.I could tell that the movie was trying to be funny and there are a few chuckles,but not much for 87 minutes.I mean,the movie drags with a capital D..There is no horror,even with the murders of the basketball team,but it takes a long time to get to them..You can probably figure out who's committing the murders a mile away,but I won't say who.This movie is bad,but not as bad as The Gingerbread Man.

There are so many concepts competing for the viewers' attention here that the end result is a Mulligan's stew of badness. Seemingly created as a vehicle for Fred Travalena (remember him?), you have a comedy with that peculiar brand of arch humor that propelled the Monkees for a few seasons before they fell out of favor. This family-friendly approach makes me think this thing may have been geared toward teens, along with a hokey, believe-in-yourself philosophy that seems to have been the driving force behind many an afterschool special. No sex, campy violence, and mild profanity reinforce this idea. Sure, it's a parody of slasher films, if the parody was written by middle schoolers for a school talent show. It's also an independent production, so lack of funds, producer meddling, and some generally bad ideas probably kept it in obscurity until Code Red resurrected it from oblivion. Still, it's somewhat charming if you're in the right mood or are jonesing for some late eighties/early nineties nostalgia.