“The Dink” key art.
Apple TV
“The Dink,” a pickleball comedy starring Jake Johnson, Mary Steenburgen, Ben Stiller, Chloe Fineman and Ed Harris, is receiving mostly positive reviews from critics on Rotten Tomatoes.
Directed by Josh Greenbaum, The Dink begins streaming on Apple TV on Friday. In the movie, Johnson plays washed-up former tennis prodigy Dusty Boyd, whose career now consists of teaching the sport to unruly kids at his father Chuck’s (Harris) suburban country club. When an old injury flares up and prevents Dusty from playing tennis, he eases up on his and his father’s revolt against pickleball, only to discover he enjoys the craze that’s taking over the courts.
Amid all his battles between the present and the past, Dusty is forced to confront his childhood rival Andy Roddick, the tennis great who is playing a fictionalized version of himself in the movie.
The Dink, which counts Stiller and Johnson among its producers, also stars Aaron Chen, Don Lake and Chris Parnell.
As of Thursday, The Dink has earned an 85% “fresh” critics’ score on Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomatometer based on 33 reviews. RT’s Critics Consensus, Audience Summary and Popcornmeter score based on verified user ratings are still pending.
How Are Individual Critics Reacting To ‘The Dink’?
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian is among the top critics on RT who gives The Dink a “fresh” score, calling it an “engagingly silly sports comedy from producer-star Jake Johnson about the world of pickleball and how this facile pseudo-tennis game for children and old people threatens to infantilize and dumb down the world of tennis itself.”
Nick Schager of The Daily Beast also awards The Dink a “fresh” score on RT, writing, “There’s something comforting about a good-natured dim-bulb film that knows how to hit its beats, elicit a few laughs, and roll credits before its hijinks grow stale.”
David Ehrlich of IndieWire also gives The Dink a “fresh” score, but with some reservations. Ehrlich writes in his RT review summary, “For all of the affection it maintains for the dorkiness of pickleball, it’s ironically hard not to wonder just how much richer this movie might have been if it were just a little more at peace with playing on its own terms.”
Carla Meyer of the San Francisco Chronicle notes The Dink’s sport comedy lineage in her “fresh” RT review summary, writing, “The Dink pays homage to the ‘00s sub-subgenre that included the gems Dodgeball and Talladega Nights and duds Blades of Glory and Semi-Pro, themselves all spiritual descendants of Caddyshack.”
William Bibbiani of The Wrap is among the top critics on RT who gives The Dink a rotten score, writing, “A tennis pro who plays pickleball — a trendy but less respected sport — isn’t amusing by itself. It’s an investment in future comedy that’s supposed to pay off at some point, and that future never comes.”
David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter also slams the movie in his “rotten” RT review summary, writing, “It’s no Challengers. In truth, it’s not much of anything beyond background noise while you’re making dinner. The most imaginative thing about it is that it’s not called Pickleball.”
The Dink begins streaming on Apple TV on Friday.
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