Movie Review: Dear John

Dear John (2010) 

Directed by Lasse Hallstrom

Written by Jamie Linden 

Starring Channing Tatum, Amanda Seyfried, Henry Thomas, Richard Jenkins 

Release Date February 5th, 2010

Published February 4th, 2010 

Dear John is a romance starring actor Channing Tatum's abs and actress Amanda Seyfried's eyes. As he takes his shirt off to reveal his ripples her wide, deep eyes travel the lengths of his musculature and boom you have a movie. This will be enough to satisfy the depraved teenage girls whose eyes will also travel the full length of Mr. Tatum's tummy again and again.

For the rest of us however, those not inclined to stare longingly at Mr. Tatum's Playgirl centerfold audition, Dear John is a dreary bore of romantic cliché and moony mawkishness.

I already described the plot, he takes his shirt off, she stares, the end, but I am sure some of you would like a little more detail. After all, Dear John did not begin life as an adaptation of Jergen De Mey's bestseller The Action Hero Body but rather as an adaptation of one of Nicholas Sparks's astonishing series of simpleminded romance hits.

Dear John tells the story of John, how inventive right. John is a soldier who while home on leave in early 2001 meets cute with Savannah (Seyfried) when she loses her purse in the ocean and he dives in to save it. She's with a boy when this happens but he has a shirt on, John doesn't and his glistening, rippling self is all it takes for that guy to go away, hell I can't even remember who he was.

John joins Savannah for a party at her home and an introduction to the special needs child she spends time with seals their fate as lifetime lovers. The love birds spend the summer together, her appreciating his repeated shirtlessness, he staring longingly if emptily into her wide pool-like eyes. Things are said but nothing is more important than their respective beauty.

Then John has to ship out and since this story is set in 2001 there is a pretty big twist coming up, wink wink. Yes, 9/11 is a plot point in this dopey romance and as the film manages to make sex, romance, mental illness, war and death trivial even the deadliest terror attack in American history can be rendered inferior when compared to the romance of two extraordinarily self important beautiful people.

What is supposed to be dramatic and romantic is captured by director Lasse Hallstrom in his typically vacant, pretty postcard style. It's a style that is relatively well placed in a film about two pretty people being pretty and for those who watch with the sound off, the style may enhance the experience. This is not an option of course for most theatergoers who will have to endure dialogue so benign and simple you can hear the breeze emanating in the characters ears as they speak. Cheesy platitudes meet at the intersection exposition and bland pop music scoring to create a mind numbing throb of vapidity. 

An ode to the ab workout, Dear John succeeds in providing fantasy material for those inclined toward Channing Tatum's rippling-ness. Otherwise, the film is one massive bore that manages to trivialize war, sex, autism and yes even 9/11. It's really rather remarkable that a film could be so offensive in such a forgettable fashion. Dear John is so dull that I can hardly muster the bile to be offended by it.

Movie Review: We Are Marshall

We Are Marshall (2006) 

Directed by McG

Written by Jamie Linden 

Starring Matthew McConaughey, Matthew Fox, Ian McShane, Anthony Mackie, Kate Mara, January Jones

Release Date December 22nd, 2006

Published December 22nd, 2006 

College football fans know of Marshall University as the alma mater of all pro wide receiver Randy Moss and quarterback Byron Leftwich. For football fans in Huntington West Virginia however, Marshall football is not just an NFL footnote, it's a way of life. A way of life that in 1970 nearly came to a violent end. In the blink of an eye a plane crash ended the lives of nearly the entire Marshall football team and support staff.

How Marshall rose from the ashes and rebuilt their shattered program is the well examined and moving subject of We Are Marshall from director McG.

In 1970 the Marshall University football team was returning from a loss to East Carolina University when their plane was struck by lightning. All 75 people on board were killed. We Are Masrshall tells the inspiring story of how the school and the town it supports picked themselves up and got back to the business of football and life.

In the fall of 1971 football coach Jack Lengyel accepted the most difficult coaching job in all of college football. Lengyel was named the new head coach of the Marshall University Thundering Herd. Less than 12 months before Lengyel accepted the job, most of the team; along with a few fans and boosters, were killed in a plane crash. The program wasn't expected to survive and now, less than a year later, Lengyel is tasked with rebuilding it from the ground up.

The story of the rebirth of Marshall football and of the small town of Huntington West Virginia that lives for it; has all of the inspirational elements to make a treacly after school special, or worse, another predictable, cloying Disney sports movie. However, thanks to the surprisingly mature and assured direction of McG, the director best known for the goofy, juvenile action of the Charlie's Angels movies, We Are Marshall manages to escape many of the pitfalls of the typical sports movie.

The first act of We Are Marshall is direct and to the point. It engages the audience in the tragedy while establishing the prominent characters including Matthew Fox as assistant coach Red Dawson who gave up his seat on the fateful flight to a fellow coach. Ian McShane as Paul Griffin who was one of Marshall football's biggest boosters until his son was killed in the crash. And finally Kate Mara as Annie whose boyfriend was Paul's son and who also provides the movies narration.

The other members of this terrific ensemble include David Straithairn as School President Donald Dedmon and a pair of players who because of injury did not travel with the team that week, Anthony Mackie as team captain Nate Ruffin and Arlen Escarpeta as quarterback Reggie Oliver. Each of the supporting players is given just enough time to hit the notes they need to hit in order to make this movie work.

Balancing such a large ensemble cast and managing to make each of the characters meaningful and engaging is a trick many veteran filmmakers struggle with. That is why the work of McG is so surprising. In only his third outing as a director, after showing ony light hearted, goofball tendencies in the Charlie's Angels movies, McG shows a great talent for getting all that he can out of his actors and his story with a mixture of quick exposition and smart performances.

Much credit goes to screenwriter Jamie Lindell who paired down a large number subplots into a smart, quick moving script that involves and engages. This is a rare script that manages to take typical genre elements and give them meaning and drama while still hitting the familiar notes. The characters are well established and despite there being so many characters, a mere few could be called underdeveloped.

The lynch pin of We Are Marshall is Matthew McConaughey whose off kilter performance starts out cringe inducing and becomes endearing. As we are introduced to coach Jack Lengyel, McConaughey plays him with heavy voacl affectations and physical tics. He walks funny, talks funny and dresses funny, even by 1970's standards. The amount of detail that McConaughey brings to the role threaten to tip over into parody and upend the strong drama of the first act of the film.

Thankfully director McG and writer Jamie Lindell give McConaughey scenes that go along way to explaining and justifying the coach's oddball personality. In a scene where Jack Lengyel is introduced to the media as the new head coach of Marshall football, Lengyel fumbles questions about whether the program should continue. The scene establishes that this is not just another inspiring figure with all the answers. Later in the film, when Lengyel sits down with Paul Griffin to try and get his support, once again the scene doesn't lead to an inspiring moment but rather Lengyel demonstrating the jockish charm that is his character but is not something that will get through Griffin's grief.

Of course Lengyel has an inspiring speech leading into a big game late in the movie but even here, McConaughey as Lengyel doesn't inspire with simplistic platitudes but rather the speech includes questionable choices that border on inappropriate unless you know Jack Lengyel, which over the course of this movie we enjoy doing.

I wouldn't go as far as to say McConaughey is Oscar worthy in this role but compared to the rest of his rather soft resume, this is a really strong performance. He leads one of the better ensemble casts assembled this year including performances by Matthew Fox and Ian McShane that could in fact be awards worthy. McConaughey's unique and charming performance is the reason We Are Marshall exists, Fox and McShane are why you are likely to love this movie.

We Are Marshall sidesteps the pitfalls of typical sports movies with a smart, charming performance by Matthew McConaughey and an inspiring story that manages to not be a mess of treacly cliches and simple uplift. We Are Marshall is an emotional and invigorating story well told by a director you would never imagine could be so mature and self assured. McG may still go by some ridiculous nickname but here he shows he has real talent and possibly a bright future.