When the Game Stands Tall Review
A good play that was sacked at the line of scrimmage.
So I have said that, while I really have no interest in watching football, baseball, hockey, tennis, golf, badmitten, curling, soccer, lacrosse, polo, dwarf tossing, dachshund racing, or bowling (actually soccer is kind of exciting to watch. I kid, I kid. Soccer sucks too) I quite enjoy a good sports movie. Major League, 42, Rollerball, A League of Their Own, Slapshot, Field of Dreams, Jerry McGuire, the Hunger Games; these are all sports movies that draw me in. While I might not be interested in watching muscular grown men sweat and strain while slapping each others behinds in real life the story of how they got there is really fascinating.
Even Peter Parker wanted out of high school.
So why did I not enjoy this film? Well first of all as the main character says frequently “It’s only high school football”. Caring about high school sports that do not involved your own kid in some way (quarterback, cheerleader, water boy) is something only creepy single middle age men with no lives do from the comfort of their parents basement (and before any of you say anything I DO NOT live in my parents basement) as a means of pretending they have things going on. As I learned the hard way high school is merely a diving board from which you launch yourself into college, the Army, or the deep fryer at your local McDonalds. A week after you graduate your sum accomplishments will have all the weight and sticking ability of a fart on a windy night. High school is not something to be enjoyed so much as endured and watching a bunch of teenagers talk about how this is the greatest moment of their lives actually left me feeling sorry for them all (Spiderman for class pres image courtesy of the Spiderman t-shirt category). The net effect leaves this film clawing desperately for a point.
Secondly movies about sports generally are good when they have a story, and this movie didn’t bother with such minutia. I’m not going to say all movies should have a standard three act structure with a protagonist, an antagonist, and some kind of main story line but if you are going to divert off that path odds are you should have some idea of what else you are going to do, rather then move from unconnected plot point to plot point like a single cell in a Brownian movement. There was a definite tone or feel to this film but in truth if felt like six different 20 minute after school specials about God and sports. It is rarely the sign of good movie when the big bad monster the hero has to slay is introduced, confronted, and defeated in the last 30 minutes of a 115 minute film.
