A Pair of Matthews Steer Moving Masterpiece We Are Marshall
Written: Feb 18 '07
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Pros: great performances, touching account of how one small town dealt with one big tragedy
Cons: hard to watch at times, especially in the immediate aftermath of the crash
The Bottom Line: Not just for football fans, We Are Marshall examines the nature of grief and regrowth through the lens of one town's tragedy.
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| bilbopooh's Full Review: We Are Marshall |
Matthew Fox just can't seem to get away from plane crashes. After getting to know him as Jack, the man largely responsible for maintaining some semblance of order amongst the castaways on LOST, my friend and I were eager to see him deal with the aftermath of another airline disaster in his new movie. Only in We Are Marshall, a true story of tragedy and triumph, his character survives the crash only because he wasn't on the plane.
Seventy-five people in the Marshall University community, including all but four members of the football team, boarded a plane back to Huntington, West Virginia on that foggy November night in 1970. As their town awaited their homecoming, the air was calm, Kelly's Heroes at the theater, Cracklin' Rosie on the radio. And then, time stood still for an announcement. Seventy-five people in the Marshall University community had been lost in an inferno just miles away. The town would never be the same.
As one of the team's coaches, Red Dawson (Fox) - who reluctantly takes on the role of assistant coach when the team is rebuilt - might well have been on that plane. Instead, he went home by a different route on official business. While everyone in the town grapples with grief in the ensuing months, his is more acute than most as he lost so many close associates, so many promising young athletes, so much faith in his ability to protect his players. Whenever I gazed into that tormented face, I almost expected that in the background, I would hear the strains of Empty Chairs at Empty Tables, the lament young revolutionary Marius sings in Les Miserables after realizing that all of his comrades have died in battle. There is darkness and conflict behind Foxy Matthew's steely eyes - so much that it's a lucky thing we have a Matthew of more mirth to balance him out.
Matthew McConaughey tends to be a bit of a goofball in his films. Here, as incoming head coach and father of three Jack Lengyel, he brings a welcome lightness to the proceedings, initiating most of the movie's funniest moments. But the humor is the result of folksy charm from a big-hearted man who volunteers to rebuild the football team after empathizing with all those bereft families. His way of doing things is sometimes unconventional, but he's passionate and effective. He's also very handy with a metaphor; his apt comparisons help him to get his way on several occasions. Though he is a stranger in this town, he learns what he can about the deceased and encourages his players to honor them by getting out there on that field.
The football aspect of the movie plays much like a typical inspirational sports movie. The team starts out a mess, consisting mostly of freshmen (thanks to a concession from the NCAA), some of whom have never played the sport before. The few returning players grow quarrelsome with all these newcomers wearing jerseys that only months before belonged to their friends, little caring about the history behind them. But as the townspeople powerfully demonstrate early in the film, seeing their beloved football team in action again could do wonders for this bereaved town, so they have to pull themselves together. And with Jack on the job, help has a tendency to come from unexpected sources.
Notable personalities include Nate Ruffin (Anthony Mackie), who bears the burden of his survivor's guilt by straining against his injured shoulder in an effort to lead his teammates to victory; Annie Cantrell (Kate Mara), a lovely young waitress who, as the fiancee of one of the doomed players, strives to assuage the sorrow and loneliness of his father (Ian McShane), one complimentary dessert at a time; and perhaps my favorite character, buttoned-up university president Donald Dedmon (David Strathairn), who struggles to settle upon the most respectful course of action in the face of such tragedy and eventually learns to let passion overtake propriety for the sake of a grieving town.
The film's two-hour running time teeters toward the over-long but doesn't cross the line. Rather, the story's gradual unfolding allows us to witness the changes that occur over the course of nearly a year as well as get a glimpse into the complications involved in starting up a football team nearly from scratch. Appealing aerial views of this coal town surrounded by mountains add to the film's beauty, as does the soundtrack, peppered with such mellow classics as Gordon Lightfoot's If You Could Read My Mind and Cat Stevens' Peace Train.
In one of We Are Marshall's earliest scenes, the ill-fated coach impresses upon his team that winning games is the only thing that matters. By the end of the film, we get the sense that this isn't true anymore. While a win is always something to strive for, Jack and Red have foresight, laying the groundwork for future champions. For now, the most important thing is just taking the field, unified, proud to play a part in the continuance of this team's legacy. We Are Marshall aspires to be a movie about perseverance, about recovering from an unfathomable ordeal and somehow finding beauty in the ashes. It succeeds.
Recommended:
Yes
Movie Mood: Serious Movie
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Epinions.com ID:
bilbopooh
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Member: Erin McCarty
Location: Erie, PA
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About Me:Viggo Mortensen anchors John Hillcoat's powerful adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's The Road.
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