We Are Marshall: Critic Reviews

We Are Marshall has little of the bone-crunching sincerity of the recent pigskin rouser Invincible. This one is more like Unconvincing.

We Are Marshall is the kind of crassly formulaic movie in which everything hinges on a single play in the final seconds of a big football game.

This was undeniably a horrific event for the victims' families friends, colleagues as well as for the entire community. But the movie seems to almost exploit this tragedy so it can make audiences weep, and ultimately, cheer.

As the world's biggest sucker for uplifting jock movies, I can heartily endorse the skillfully manipulative We Are Marshall.

This is the rare football drama (Friday Night Lights is another) that gives you a sense of what football means to a town.

Even by the low standards of the young-jocks-as-good-clean-soldiers movie, there's little at stake here, unless you count the kids' hunger to win one for the Gipper.

It looks like every inspirational sports movie we've seen in the last five years.

Too bad the film doesn't sustain the mix of sorrow and hope the story requires.

'Restrained' and 'tasteful' are not words normally associated with McG, the director best known for countless music videos and the Charlie's Angels movie franchise. We Are Marshall could change that.

Matthew McConaughey injects some much needed life as the oddball coach who sets out to rebuild the football squad, and David Strathairn, Ian McShane, and Robert Patrick do their best with sketchy characters and artless dialogue.

The film is emotionally affecting without being particularly distinguished.

May be noted as the one that flipped McConaughey from underachieving movie idol to terrific character actor.

Among sports movies, We Are Marshall scores enough for respectability.

Full of good intentions, We Are Marshall has a game plan that's hard to fault, but as with any playbook, a scheme is only as good as how well it's executed.

A better film would have acknowledged the limits of sport and discovered that when you're in mourning all you can do is distract yourself, either by hard work (on the part of the surviving teammates) or meaningless entertainment (the fans).

We Are Marshall (it's the rally cry of the team) doesn't always have a handle on the grief, but it does keep emotions close to the surface. That allows McConaughey to be the most refreshing, funny and believable he ever has been.

What's missing is any kind of insight into the lives of the dead players or the members of the Young Thundering Herd who rise up to replace them.

An entirely serviceable night out for buddies looking to locate hidden feelings.

We Are Marshall is precisely what one expects from a true sports story: it's uplifting and inspiring.

What should have been an inspirational story about fortitude and courage in the face of mind-numbing tragedy becomes a compendium of sports cliches.

The movie certainly has its heart in the right place, but that alone just isn't enough.

McConaughey's performance is oddly comic but actually serves to counter more traditional interpretations of a stoic coach leading his charges.