Al's Omniflick: Draft Day

Friday, April 18, 2014

Draft Day

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Ivan Reitman, Starring: Kevin Costner, Jennifer Garner, Frank Langella and Dennis Leary

No one would ever confuse Ivan Reitman for Alain Resnais or Luis Bunuel; nuance and penetrating character studies aren't his forte. No one would also confuse Draft Day for Moneyball; Bennett Miller's terrific, wonky, thinking man's baseball film that had no love-for-the-game prerequisite. I can't imagine anyone enjoying Draft Day who isn't a football fan. I heard a young woman chattering away with her male companion during the film but judging from her comments, she wasn't much interested in the intricacies of NFL player trade and acquisition. So what would draw one to a movie heavy on draft and trade arcana? It couldn't be the relationship between Cleveland Browns General Manager Sonny Weaver Jr. (Kevin Costner) and a team executive named Ali (Jennifer Garner); though cute and pleasing to the eye, is all gravy and no mash potatoes. It also couldn't be Sonny's tempestuous relationship with his mother Barb (Ellen Burstyn), which flickers but doesn't burn.

Fortunately for me, I am a football fan and enjoyed the cutthroat dealings between NFL general managers as they fight for draft day pole positions, which a consummate professional like Kevin Costner makes fascinating with his natural acting and thermal charisma.

Writers Scott Rothman and Rajiv Joseph spoil Costner with dialogue crafted to demonstrate Sonny's cunning as he wheels and deals but they seem lost when it comes to the Sonny/Ali relationship; which has the added wrinkle of her pregnancy to complicate Sonny's life. Granted, the story takes place in one day but the relationship demands more than a hurried, on the fly, series of closet discussions a pesky administrative assistant keeps interrupting.

During draft day, Sonny is coerced into trading up to the number one position by the Brown's no-nonsense owner Anthony Molina (Frank Langella), who casually issues an ultimatum which might cost the GM his job. Sonny proposes a deal with the Seattle Seahawks GM, which is so weighted in the latter's favor that it strains (though doesn't shatter) plausibility. Sonny must give up the Browns' number one picks for the next three years for the top spot in the draft. It is implicit the number one pick is for a stud quarterback named Bo Callahan; a player most teams salivate over and like Sonny, are willing to sacrifice players and future picks to acquire.

The Brown's fans are livid when they learn Sonny has traded away their future on a player he discovers may have character issues, or as his mother puts it: "You sold a cow for magic beans?!" Molina on the other hand, is ecstatic over the trade and at the possibility the Browns may draft Callahan. Two other potential draftees and their agents woo Sonny; hoping to land lucrative, first-round contracts though his staff and the media are all screaming for Callahan.

We also learn Sonny's late father was a legendary Browns' coach and one he had to fire, causing him regret and much angst. The current Browns' coach; Penn (Dennis Leary; wonderfully cast) wavers in his support for Sonny; threatening to withhold his support when he discovers the three key draft picks might be traded away.

The drama mounts as the NFL Draft approaches and all of Sonny's problems appear conspiratorial: possible dismissal from his position, his pregnant girlfriend unhappy with a lack of commitment, fan rage, coach and staff mutiny, agents and prospective draftees breathing down his neck and his credibility as a GM hanging in the balance.

And in spite of Reitman's contrivances and Moneyball pretensions, Draft Day doesn't really work but it is fun to watch; again, Costner is the key. Every-time he speaks, we listen and believe he could be a General Manager and someone many would heed. When we aren't listening to Sonny, the other characters seem like Lego people; assembled, colorful and plastic. The director who gave us a comic classic like Ghostbusters may be out of his league, so to speak, in trying to show us a cross section of a professional sports general manager's day but the film will please football fans and it has a stamp of timeliness as the REAL NFL draft rapidly approaches. And if you aren't a football fan, well, at least you have your choice of eye-eclairs like Costner and Garner.

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On DVD

Fury (1936)

Director: Fritz Lang

Though we might normally think of the films M and Metropolis when director Fritz Lang becomes the topic of conversation, less known is the legendary director's work in Hollywood. Having fled the ever-growing menace of Nazi Germany for America in the early 1930s', Lang eventually found himself under contract for MGM.

Though his work in Hollywood is very uneven, one standout is Fury, from 1936. Starring Spencer Tracy and Sylvia Sydney, the film's condemnation of mob justice seems spectacularly daring now, considering lynching was still a reality in Depression-era America. We don't see one black person in the film entire but we know precisely for whom Lang film is sympathetic.

Spencer Tracy plays Joe Wilson, who is arrested in a small town while en route to meet his fiance, Katherine (Sylvia Sydney). Suspected of being part of a kidnapping of a little girl, Wilson is arrested on the flimsiest evidence. While he sits in cell; angry and indignant, Katherine is puzzled as to why her fiance hasn't arrived at their prearranged meeting place.

But Wilson's fortunes take a darker and more dangerous turn when a mob--already on edge--is roused to anger. Egging one another on, the mob moves on the jailhouse where Wilson is being held. As the angry gathering becomes a mass, drawing citizens of the town into their swelling numbers, a lynch-mob begins to form. The sheriff, determined to see due process take its course, refuses their forceful demands. Becoming angrier and angrier and bolder and bolder, the crowd storms the jail, overwhelming the sheriff and his deputies. Unable to unlock the cell doors to reach Wilson, the mob sets the jailhouse ablaze as an alternate method of lynching.

Katherine, having arrived on the scene, faints when she sees flames engulf the cell where her fiance is held.

In spite of the mob acting as a faceless entity, its principle members are brought to trial though the town and the defendants maintain a conspiracy of silence, hoping to escape convictions and censure.

A sure acquittal seems imminent until damning evidence assures their guilt. When the majority of the members receive death sentences, Wilson turns up at his brothers, having survived the fire. Knowing the public is unaware of his survival, he vows to stay in hiding to ensure the mob conspirators are executed.

The scene where Katherine, nearly insane from grief, comes face to face with Joe is a powerful moment in the film. As she slowly recovers from her state, she realizes Joe's vindictive determination to see the mob hang is in itself a great injustice.

The story climaxes during a stirring courtroom scene that brings the fascinating story to a close.

I would have never expected Hollywood to make a statement as powerful as Fury made in 1936. Given the fact that lynchings in America at the time went unpunished, the movie railed bravely, in spite of the main character being white rather than black, against what was then the status quo. The Oxbow Incident would make a similar and commensurately powerful statement seven years later.

The film's willingness to peer into the darker side of American life could be partly attributed to Lang, who co-wrote the story and who was no stranger to exploring the darker side of humanity. Having seen evil flower in his home country, it makes sense Lang would choose to tell this story.

Spencer Tracy and Sylvia Sydney give wonderful, emotionally layered performances. Katherine's near descent into madness is depicted touchingly by Sydney. To see Tracy's mild-mannered Wilson become angry and vengeful is heartbreaking.

Even watching Lang's film on a small screen does little to diminish its power. Weeks after the viewing, I still can't shake its indelible images or its angry indictment of one of America's great crimes. One couldn't devise a better title than one it was given eighty years ago. Fury indeed.