Forget the critics, make up your own mind

Rating: 10/10 (23 December 2006)

This movie, contrary to what some of the critics might say, is worth your 2 hours and 15 minutes. I just walked out of the theater less than two hours ago, and not a single person moved until the white lights came on. The entire theater was glued to the presentation until the last name flashed across the credits.
Sure, the movie might appear to be "overacted", "clichéd", "formulary", even predictable at some points; but here is what is different from the "typical football movie": it's not about the football. This movie is about how both the town of Huntington and the University both handled their collective grief, and how the only way either was going to survive emotionally. Sometimes, we have to "get back on the horse" when we fall off, and this story is an example of that.
Matt M spent about 6 weeks with Jack Lengyel before shooting started, and learned as much as he could about not only the story, but the man he was going to portray. He practiced and labored over the hand gestures, catch phrases, facial expressions, clothes and the like that had become known as "Lengyelisms." Anyone who thinks that there was anything cliché, overacted, embellished, or exaggerated in this movie know nothing about the story or the people in it.
WHO CARES IF McG DIRECTED THIS MOVIE?!?! Just because someone has a reputation for making campy, silly, slick stuff doesn't mean they do not have the potential to make something serious and uplifting. Sure, I will admit that McG would not have been on my short list of directors considered for a story as poignant and verifiable as this one is. Everything in this movie can be checked out if someone wanted to take the time. The families and friends left behind in Huntington played a very large role in making this happen, and they would not allow anything made-up (except specific dialog in conversations, of course) to even be filmed, much less make it to the final product. Give the man a chance, I think he did a great job, and FINALLY painted West Virginia and West Virginians as more than coal miners, hillbillies, cannibals (The Hills Have Eyes, Wrong Turn) or some other negative stereotype. Thank you McG for finally treating the people of West Virginia like human beings, and fellow Americans, and not a joke.
Go see the movie, put yourself in their shoes. Ask yourself "how would I have handled this if it were my husband, father, son, brother in that crash?" What would you have wanted your college or town to do if faced with that kind of tragedy? If you can honestly say that you wouldn't have done the same thing, or something like it, then you wouldn't understand the point, and maybe should have watched "Eragon" instead.