6/10

The newest in a field of high school football films is the story of De La Salle high school football coach Bob Ladeuceur (Jim Caviezel) heading the longest winning streak in sports history of 151 straight wins. When the team finally does lose, the school and town find itself at a crossroads between what is right for these kids, and their own selfish ambitions. I thought this film was good, but not great. The biggest problem this film will face is that it will be forgettable to much better films of the genre like Friday Night Lights, Remember the Titans, and Varsity Blues. What makes those films better is that the players all have legit troubles that they must overcome and not just the loss of a football game. That’s not to say that i didn’t enjoy When The Game Stands Tall because it does communicate to us the sports fan how crazy we get over a child’s game. The acting of some of the townspeople is a little over the top at times, but to get a look from the outside is showing just how extreme some people take sports. The film does a great job communicating the meaningful relationship that this coach has with his players. To him, football is just a stepping stone for turning these kids into respectable men. Caviezel plays Bob well and never getting wrapped up in the things he has accomplished in his 15 years at the school. Supporting performances by Michael Chiklis and Laura Dern are also noteworthy. Dern always tends to get a little sappy and sentimental with her performances, but i think she brought out the best parts in Bob’s wife as a loving and supportive woman who holds the fort down at home. Chiklis is decent, but i wish he had more screen time and lines. He is the most accomplished actor of the film, but he is reduced to a supporting role as an assistant coach. I didn’t have any problems with the running time of 110 minutes as the movie is paced pretty ideally. I personally think the film should’ve ended 15 minutes earlier because i feel like the better example is cast in the first ending. The last fifteen minutes serve as just another accomplishment by this team in a movie that is full of nothing but them. It ended at exactly the right time because the film was starting to dive into dragging mode. Without question, the films biggest problem is the nagging cliches that films like these always accomplish. Whether it’s the fact that there will always be a happy ending, or the unintentionally laughable scenes that make the movie feel like a spoof of itself when it’s not trying to be. An example of this is the sappy inspirtational music that plays every time Ladeuceur gives a speech to his team. Scenes like that make it hard to buy into anything for nearly 2 hours. The same goes for a band of misfits who don’t get along at the start of the season, but then become an unstoppable machine because they realize that they are all they have in the world. It doesn’t ruin the movie, but it keeps it from being the MVP of a story that it is in real life. The camera angles are done well with lots of running down the field shots that are always hard to capture. The camera is right there in the middle of the action when it’s heart pounding. I also thought it was pretty cool to see the real life footage of De La Salle High School during the end credits. It always means more when you see that a film’s protagonist is really thought of in this light for the things he has done to the community. It all goes a lot further than just football; it’s his investment in these kids before he releases them to the world. That is where the game stands the tallest for director Thomas Carter and his cast. When The Game Stands Tall is riddled in cliches and bad dialogue, but it connects in it’s audience when it needs to the most. This team might not have the toughest goals to acheive, but you will be cheering for their success by film’s end. I recommend it to sports fans only, but it would be fine to wait till DVD.