Since I am trying to write about all of the movies that I see at the Mill Valley Film Festival, I thought that I would write about other films that I am seeing during this time. I really shouldn't be seeing much else, since the Festival takes up so much time, but there are always opportunities for extra entertainment and I take advantage of them when possible.
After the 5@5 on Friday night, my wife and I went to see "Friday Night Lights" with a couple of friends. One of those friends used to play high school football in Texas and so had a particularly keen interest in seeing this movie. While we haven't spoken at length about his experience with football in Texas, or about how it is depicted in this movie, I feel like he was able to identify with many of the basic elements that are covered. His experience, along with the little I know about high school football in Texas, assures me that the excitement and awe at the way football is treated in this movie is genuine. And this is what part of the greatness of this movie is made up of.
Friday Night Lights is based on the true story of one season in the life of the Permian High School Football team. In many ways it is a typical sports movie. It has the crazy characters, the dramatic ups and downs, the exciting showdown with the inhumanly good (or sized) team, and all of the complex relationships between the players and their fans or families. In the case of Friday Night Lights, though, it is able to succeed beyond most other sports movies because of its ability to avoid delving into stereotypical teenage behavior and portray the players as real humans.
Much like Drumline before it, it avoids most of the typical "sex, drugs and rock & roll" fixations that many high school movies focus on. While some of those movies have a place (Fast Times comes to mind), a film that shows students striving to better themselves is a much more inspirational endeavor. This film does exactly that. While maintaining an entertaining edge to it, with plenty of humor and heartache, it stays firm in the conviction that these kids have way too much pressure put on them at such a young age.
I can see how people might react as my wife did. You watch a movie like this and realize that the physical and emotional abuse that teenagers have to go through is almost unbearable. Especially in a small Texas town where the football team represents all of the glory and all of the memories for its adults, the issues are all the more magnified. I can't imagine anyone who would want to subject their children to this kind of environment. Then again, I believe that struggle and challenge, when delivered appropriately, can be a great asset to a child's upbringing. Balancing those things is the key. In this small town, you very rarely get to see any balance applied to these kids, and that is a shame.
Friday Night Lights was a very good movie. It many outlets it is being billed as one of the greatest sports movies of all time. I don't think that you can go that far, but it is clearly superior to most sports movies, and certainly much better than most of the movies depicting teenagers that have been recently released. While not for everyone (you should have some amount of appreciation for football before seeing this), it is worth the time and emotional investment to join these kids on this crazy ride.
