Balls Up proves man cannot live on dick jokes alone

See, smarmy salesman Brad (Wahlberg) and nervous designer Elijah (Hauser) are prophylactic professionals, tasked with pitching their latest condom to the folks in Brazil hosting the World Cup—an event that outpaces even the Olympics when it comes to the sheer quantity of sex. The pair initially make the sale (their newfangled condom also covers up the balls because…it’s funny to talk about balls) only to screw it up at the afterparty and sink their company. Luckily, the tickets they earned to the World Cup Final upon making that sale were never canceled, so they end up going back to the country to attend, screw things up again, and get declared personae non gratae. Because this is a comedy with no desire to win over the country of its setting, that means running from deranged football fans, drug lords, and corrupt government officials—you know, the full spectrum of Brazil’s population.

But while that strangely convoluted plot description may give the false impression of movement or excitement, of a romp full of antics, Balls Up is very much in the standard streaming comedy vein of “people standing around,” despite copious amounts of cocaine, an excruciating amount of karaoke, and so, so, many condoms. Despite the kinda-picturesque locale (Balls Up was actually shot in Australian studios a couple years ago), there’s nothing in the script to take advantage of any of its specificity; one could’ve trotted out these tired dick jokes in Toledo and saved a couple bucks. 

As with the rest of these more stagnant films, it wouldn’t matter so much if the jokes, or even the performers, were funny. But Wahlberg’s snide confidence is as worn and grating as the snickering-during-sex-ed gags, with the more charismatically goofy Hauser left stranded by scene partner and material alike. As the duo traipse from one illogical incident to the next, often accompanied by a slumming guest star like Benjamin Bratt or Eric André (or an annoyance like Sacha Baron Cohen), Farrelly’s film wanders aimlessly without being driven by anything absurd or outrageous enough to conjure a Hangover-like reaction, nor anything with enough humanity to justify the occasional heart-to-heart conversations between Brad and Elijah.

Yet, this emptiness doesn’t stop Balls Up from dragging its hapless odd couple around for an hour and 40 minutes. While much of this is spent on the gaudily complicated set-up, there’s plenty of repetition and dead air to give Amazon Prime time to experience technical difficulties (or for viewers to find the remote buried in their cushions).

Director: Peter Farrelly
Writer: Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Paul Walter Hauser, Molly Shannon, Benjamin Bratt, Daniela Melchior, Eric André, Sacha Baron Cohen
Release Date: April 15, 2026 (Amazon Prime Video)