When a movie this awful tosses the adjective “bad” into its title, we call it truth in advertising. Look beyond the easy-target moniker and you’ll find even more bad news: Richard Linklater’s remake of Michael Ritchie’s misfits-on-the-mound classic is a major league disappointment, a mean-spirited, insensitive, and racist misfire that should have Walter Matthau and original Bad News Bears screenwriter Bill Lancaster spinning in their graves.
Linklater scored critical praise for his similarly paced School of Rock, and makes only slight alterations to the slacker-mentors-kids formula in hopes of duplicating his success. His cringeworthy Bears places former major league pitcher Morris Buttermaker (Billy Bob Thornton) in charge of a scornful army of selfish brats, then marches them through conventional hurdles on the way to a preposterous championship game.
See Filmcritic.com for full review