BALLS UP (2026)

Starring Mark Wahlberg, Paul Walter Hauser, Benjamin Bratt, Eva De Dominici, Daniela Melchior, Molly Shannon, Sacha Baron Cohen, Luciano Szafir, Eric André, Chelsey Crisp, Jackson Tozer, Henrietta Amevor, Abe Farrelly, Ryan Shelton, Nathalie Oliveira, Thiago Moreas, Sloan Fischer, Gianni Deguara, Juliana Castro and the voice of Larry David.

Screenplay by Rhett Reese & Paul Wernick.

Directed by Peter Farrelly.

Distributed by Amazon/MGM. 104 minutes. Rated R.

Every year movie reviewers put together a list of the worst movies of the year. Well, we’re only in April, but I think we have already found a lock for the worst movie of 2026. Balls Up is so endlessly awful that I can’t imagine any other film outdoing it in sheer terribleness or even coming close. At least I hope to God that none does.

It has one of the most ridiculous concepts in film. It is full of jokes, none of which work. (In fairness, I laughed out loud once and lightly chuckled one other time, but even those jokes weren’t so much funny as simply shocking.) The humor is homophobic, sexist, and dumb. The acting is awful. The situations are ridiculous. The action sequences are disjointed and silly.

It’s not just that it feels completely out of touch with the modern world – like a throwback to the old days when Peter Farrelly was a fairly popular writer/director with his brother on the likes of Dumb and Dumber, Kingpin and There’s Something About Mary (all films that were not as good as their reputations suggest). It’s not just that it’s trying to be edgy and sexy and instead is being puerile and gross.

It’s not even that Mark Wahlberg is mugging so desperately for a laugh that never comes that it makes you long for him to return to his religious projects, or that it completely wastes the talents of actual actors like Paul Walter Hauser and Benjamin Bratt. It’s not even the fact that it has supporting roles by both Sasha Baron Cohen AND Molly Shannon.

Well, okay, it’s all of those things. But it’s so much viler than even that. I could try to explain the plot to you, but then we would all feel the need to take a shower. Just trust me about this. You really, really do not want to see Balls Up.

Jay S. Jacobs

Copyright ©2026 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: April 14, 2026.