Release Date: December 22, 1999
Starring: Al Pacino, Cameron Diaz, Jamie Foxx, Dennis Quaid, James Woods, LL Cool J, Matthew Modine
Directed by: Oliver Stone
Distributed by: Warner Brothers
MPAA Rating: R (strong language, some nudity/sexuality)
On the eve of the third millenium, most major sports are nearing or have passed the first hundred years since their inception. Baseball dates back to the 1870s, and hockey to a similar time frame. Basketball was invented by James Naismith in 1891, and football, a variant form of the English game rugby, began to take on its present-day form around 1900. And while the games have remained essentially the same over the first hundred years, the nature of their professional varieties has changed dramatically. The advent of the million-dollar contract and all-sports networks like ESPN have made professional athletics more of an entertainment industry than anything else. The average age of pro athletes is slowly but steadily dropping to the lower twenties. In a time when it is acceptable for an exceptionally talented individual to waive a college career in favor of going pro after high school, it is not surprising to see a nineteen-year-old star arguing over the finer points of his lucrative endorsement contract. Of course, for every example of the degeneration of professional sports there is an example of criticism, and Oliver Stone's film Any Given Sunday is no exception. Stone has fashioned a movie which pits the new against the old and stands firmly with the traditional ways of the men who built today's pro sports empires, but unfortunately his criticism is rendered ineffectual by a chaotic, kaleidoscopic style of filmmaking.
Furthermore, Any Given Sunday takes 165 minutes to run its course, which means that in addition to being chaotic and kaleidoscopic, it's also bloated. As a filmmaker, Stone has given audiences such interminable examples of cinema before, but the examples that come readily to mind -- his biopic Nixon and his political thriller JFK -- were more deserving of such excessive running times. But this film does not muscle its way into that upper echelon, mostly because it lacks the interesting, engaging story line of Stone's previous efforts. The director intends to display a clash between old school and new school mentalities, and in this he succeeds; but he could have done just as well in a forty-five minute TV spot. Instead, he attempts to base a film that's nearly three hours long on a simple thematic message, and as the viewer's rapidly stiffening buttocks will testify, the technique does not work.
The story is essentially that of Major League, only about football and done from a dramatic angle rather than a comedic one. Tony D'Amato (Al Pacino), head coach of the fictional Miami Sharks, led his team to back-to-back league championships under the auspices of quarterback Cap Rooney (Dennis Quaid) -- four years ago. Since then, the glory years have waned, and now the Sharks are simply struggling to make the playoffs. Their chances don't look good when both Rooney and his immediate backup are injured in the same game, placing the unreliable Willie Beamen (Jamie Foxx) at the helm. Despite a shaky beginning, however, Beamen soon gains confidence and has the Sharks on a winning streak -- which is great, until the success goes to his head. Soon he's hoarding the glory, refusing to run the plays that D'Amato is calling, placing himself in jeopardy with his teammates and placing his coach in jeopardy with the team's new owner, power-hungry heiress Christina Pagniacci (Cameron Diaz). Things begin to fall apart at the worst possible time, with the playoffs only a few weeks away and the race for the remaining slots very tight.
Such a plot could have been decent, but it's not carried by the acting corps. Pacino, in the lead, is a cardboard replica of Vince Lombardi, legendary head coach of the Green Bay Packers in the 1960s. Unlike today's head coaches, he eschews the custom-made team apparel in favor of a simple tweed jacket and the peaked fedora hat. Only an actor like Pacino could make this façade work, and to some extent he does. The strength of his dramatic potential is limited, though, because his good scenes never pile themselves up. Even the would-be rousing pre-game speech before the final game is bit lackluster, if only because it's so cliché.
Cameron Diaz is passable as the new young owner, although she doesn't complement Pacino the way his co-star should. Dennis Quaid and Jamie Foxx are the generic good and bad guys, although unfortunately, the bad guy doesn't really get his comeuppance -- which is what the audience wants. Instead, the two competing quarterbacks dance around a confrontation, stripping the subplot of any possible spark. It's impossible for the audience to make a judgement call on either of the two characters, because the ensemble cast prevents Stone from giving adequate time to either player off the field -- even with the two-and-a-half hour-plus running time. On the field, Stone and cinematographer Salvatore Totino call for twisting, restless camerawork which prevents the audience from actually watching the on-field action. It has the unexpected effect of depositing the viewer on the field without a single weapon with which to defend himself, and within seconds the novelty of the idea wears off. The audience wants to watch the game, at least some of the time, ESPN-style: from the sidelines, in one continuous shot. Stone does not comply.
For those who've not seen Major League, the movie may be a bit more interesting, and possibly even enjoyable. The thematic story of an aging player's fall from grace is momentarily intriguing, especially after watching earlier-this-year's For Love of the Game. In that film, Kevin Costner starred as the weary Detroit Tigers' ace Billy Chapel, who, in the final game of his nineteen-year career, achieved every pitcher's greatest dream by throwing a perfect game. But in football the final fade-out is much less graceful and far more gruesome, exemplifying the statement that "baseball is what America aspires to be, but football is what America really is." These moments of provocative storytelling comprise only a fraction of Sunday's running time, however, and aren't enough to sustain the film. Although Oliver Stone has certainly been successful in the past, he has come up short in fashioning a movie about what he called a "game that would seduce me for hours at a time." Football fans should go elsewhere.
all contents © 1999 Craig Roush