30 Day Film Challenge-Day 16

​A film that is personal to you

Today’s film gets a little more personal, much like my first film in this list (the first film I remember watching – Dumbo) but for a very different reason.

There are some films that cement themselves in your brain in relation to a specific event or episode in your life and Dodgeball is one of those for me. Besides being a hilarious film, it is one of the movies that I watched on the evening that I proposed to my wife nearly 15 years ago.

The story goes like this. My girlfriend at the time (now my wife) and I had been invited over to a friend’s house to celebrate the New Year. It was a small gathering of a few friends and we spent the evening just relaxing, enjoying a few drinks, and watching some movies. My wife will tell the story and stress the fact that I was being a complete jerk the entire evening. Of course, she didn’t know that I had a ring burning a hole in my pocket and was planning on popping the question at midnight when the ball dropped in Times Square. (I know it’s cliché, but it was the best I could do). I had asked her father’s permission a week prior at a Christmas gathering and had only told him, my own parents, and a few select co-workers about my plans.

Obviously, she said “yes” and we were married a year and a half later, spending the last 14+ years together.

Not only did watching this movie the first time coincide with our engagement, but it’s one we have returned to over an over throughout our relationship. We often quote lines from the film to each other. (“If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball” anyone?) We love the oversized personalities in the film, especially Ben Stiller’s White Goodman and Rip Torn’s Patches O’Houlihan. The main cast is hysterical and there are some great cameos from Gary Cole and Jason Bateman playing the dodgeball tournament announcers to Hank Azaria as a younger Patches and of course Lance Armstrong, Chuck Norris, and David Hasselhoff, all playing various versions of themselves.

I’m not sure if it’s because of the association I have with that happy day of my life, or just because it’s such a fun movie, but I come back to this one often. Just like yesterday’s pick, I find myself watching this through to the end if I come across it on TV. If you haven’t seen it before, or it’s been a while, go check it out and have a few laughs at the expense of being getting smacked in the face with big rubber balls!

Day 15 – A film that makes you feel happy | Day 17 – Favorite film sequel

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