Just as it’s predecessor, Friday Night Lights, Stand Tall is a re telling of actual events about actual people. Embellished to fit the mold of the movie structure which ultimately strips away the importance of what a leader and his gridiron soliders were able to accomplish over a span of six years, one hundred and fifty one wins — no loses.
The tailer led everyone to believe that after the end of “The Streak”, life for the members of the 151-0 De Lasalle Spartans was over. The death of a player, lack of team spirit, and the temporary lost of their coach were only three causes attributed to why this team would never regain its position as a powerhouse in the nations high school football rankings which was highly misleading but exemplary of the message of the movie: it’s just football.
Easy to say but when football is all you’ve known– your possible salvation, then football is life. A shot at being the greatest team ever to hold a winning streak not only boast your efforts as individual players but make you Gods within the community…. infallible. Lose and you become an afterthought. For for the group of teens presented in this film, all was seemingly lost. They were the team to ruin the streak and furthermore ruin the perception of invincibility. Only it wasn’t the tall-tale end of the story as the next game was just a week away. The chance to make your own legacy is always a week away with high school. The phenomenon of “The Streak” exist only in the minds of fans and media but for the player, “The Streak”, is in each victory. Each week. Each successfully executed play.
When the Game Stands Tall left much to the imagination and the story would be better served as a documentary or book (which it is). Personal accounts are more sutible for content like this unless you take the time to develop characters and plot senerios to encourage the audience to feel. We spent too much time with field play which contradicts the message of it’s just a game. If it were ’just a game’ then show us more of what happen behind “The Streak” than just glimpses used as exposition to move the story along.
Tis is now the season of foozeball and if you want the action of the gridiron you have many different options to choose from that will excite more than choreographed hits and catches.