Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby

...the summer comedy winner that clocks more laughs per minute than any other.

—Pete Hammond Maxim

...a pitch-perfect parody of an auto-racing biopic...

—Jim Emerson Chicago Sun-Times

Sure, the plot gets a little loose, particularly in the middle, but the French/gay jokes and Applebee's references are very distracting.

—Caroline Kepnes E!

I'll be watching this on video several times - but I will be hitting fast forward.

—Kyle Smith New York Post

...worth getting revved up over, though non-Ferrell fans will be unimpressed no matter how many times he strips to his skivvies. But those who appreciate his sense of humor will be utterly entertained by his efforts to kick it into high gear.

—Angel Cohn TV Guide

...skirts the line between parody and homage so well that you will hardly be able to tell whether Will Ferrell and his Anchorman collaborator Adam McKay are poking fun at or celebrating NASCAR culture.

—Annette Cardwell filmcritic.com

...a boisterously funny film.

—Leah Rozen People

...the joy of the movie lies in its randomness, its willingness to indulge the private and obscure.

—Scott Foundas LA Weekly

The movie takes some dark, violent turns once Crudup enters the picture, and loses some of its initial soft, regional charm. But Kinnear and Crudup are funny, and the plot does fold together with the kind of cruel logic that these sorts of twist-a-thons often lack.

—Noel Murray Onion AV Club

...a bit of a mess, but it is a genial mess, and one that will make you laugh.

—Kenneth Turan Los Angeles Times

A Will Ferrell blowhard must, of course, be brought down, and Talladega Nights grows flakier and more uneven the lower Ricky falls. The races, however, are scorchingly shot, and they lend the movie a zest that was missing from Anchorman, Ferrell's last collaboration with director/co-writer Adam McKay. This one scores laughs right down to its gloriously gaga climactic smooch.

—Owen Gleiberman Entertainment Weekly

A laugh-out-loud funny send-up of NASCAR...

—Tim Knight Reel

...the tale of Ricky Bobby (Ferrell, of course), an abandoned kid who grows up to be a famous NASCAR driver, is beside the point. It's just the watered-down glue that keeps the movie from playing like a series of sketches in which grown-ass men do dumbass-kid stuff for nearly two hours.

—Robert Wilonsky Village Voice

Cohen and Ferrell riff off each other with inspired lunacy. So it's hard to watch when the plot thickens and congeals with scenes involving Ricky's love for his absentee daddy (Gary Cole) and a totally unnecessary romance with his assistant, Susie, well played by Amy Adams but quite a comedown from her Oscar-nominated turn last year in Junebug.

—Peter Travers Rolling Stone

...a ragged, intermittently uproarious fusion of sketch-comedy goofing and driving around in circles...

—A. O. Scott New York Times

Rambunctious and synthetic, Talladega Nights boasts its fair share of inspired Ferrell riffs, even if, as a satire of the NASCAR subculture, it mostly runs on fumes.

—Fernando F. Croce Slant Magazine

...hit-and-miss shenanigans, which more often miss than hit.

—Peter Rainer Christian Science Monitor

...a one-note satire of NASCAR culture.

—Nicole Schmuelien Premiere

...lacks the guts of genuine satire (its estimated $85 million dollar budget was too big for that), and it sputters as a good ol' boy outing with occasional forays into sincerity.

—Michael Phillips Chicago Tribune