Marshall University's Tragic 1970 Plane Crash and the Rebuilding of the team and the hearts of the community surrounding it.

Rating: 10/10 (1 January 2007)

OK. So I rated it a ten because I am biased. I live in Huntington West Virginia. The Home of Marshall University and the Thundering Herd. Having known many of the people who lost loved ones in the plane crash that claimed 75 members of the Team, Coaches, Boosters and our Local Civic Leaders I was a little nervous when I heard last year that Hollywood was coming to Huntington to film on a subject so close to our hearts. The plane crash completely and totally dissolved us into tears that was years in healing. As the film says at the end. In the 70's there was nobody that lost more games than Marshall. It was a great deal of blood and tears and back breaking work that made the team rise from ashes to glory in the eighties and nineties. I went to watch the filming with baited breath like many here. Hoping beyond hope that Hollywood would not represent us as Backwoods hillbilly's sitting on bales of hay and spitting tobacco juice everywhere. That is not who we are at all and would of been very unfair. But in seeing this movie they pulled no shots. They came here, They sat down with us and in the end they told our story to the very best of their ability. I think of myself as a pretty hard guy and I have to confess. I came out of the theater with tears in my eye's. To see just what it took for the team to get that first win and how nobody thought it possible in that first season after the crash. It did a lot to sooth and heal the community at large. Red Dawson I know very well. He built the house I live in with his construction company. I thought it depicted him very well. Matthew Fox did a brilliant job as did the rest of the cast. McG. The Director no matter where he lives is now and forever a citizen of Huntington West Virginia as we have adopted him as a part of our community. Brilliant Movie, True to life for the most part. Nat Ruffins part gave homage to the great man he was in life. He truly did keep the Herd alive when most of it died in the crash. I urge everyone to go see WE ARE MARSHALL. If you don't like it as a Movie it is one hell of a documentary... GO HERD!!! FEEL THE THUNDER!!!!