I don’t usually get into war movies, but I usually really like Korean films. There’s kind of a dichotomy there, because there are a lot of Korean war movies (many of which are about the Korean War, but others are simply war movies created by Korean filmmakers). Some of them, like J.S.A. and Tae Guk Gi, are phenomenal, but others like The Front Line (which was inexplicably South Korea’s submission for best foreign film last year) are underwhelming. Fortunately, while I would have preferred My Way to be a little shorter, it turned out to be one of the good ones.

The film opens in the 1920s, at a time when Korea was a colony of the Japanese Empire rather than an independent nation, and certainly before it was split into two countries. The Japanese living there (primarily as representatives of the imperial government) saw the Koreans as a lesser class of people, but they still mostly got along. Jun-shik Kim (played by Dong-gun Jang, who was also in Tae Guk Gi) was just a boy at the time, and he loved running. He was the fastest around, and had aspirations of one day running in an Olympic marathon. But when Tetsuo Hasegawa moved into the village with his father, Jun-shik found that he had some real competition. Over the years while they were growing up, they kept running against each other, and each repeatedly lost and reclaimed the honor of the village running champion.

As the years passed and the risk of another world war began to rise, there was also a rise in tension between the Japanese and Koreans. In Jun-shik’s village, this tension came to a head when war was imminent and Jun-shik emerged the victor after a close race for Olympic eligibility, only to be unfairly disqualified by the Japanese race officials. The Koreans began to riot, and after the dust settled, all Korean men involved in the fight were ordered to fight alongside the Japanese in the war. This included Jun-shik, and he found himself assigned as a subordinate of Tetsuo, who quickly acquired a reputation as a merciless taskmaster with little regard for the well-being of his underlings.

Although it’s probably an unusual comparison, My Way reminds me a bit of War Horse. Clearly all the main characters are human rather than equine, but there are actually a number of similarities between plots. But where I strongly disliked War Horse (because of a protagonist that didn’t do anything beyond self-preservation, and nothing at all that would be considered heroic), it worked better in My Way because of the humanity of those involved and their ability to make choices beyond themselves. The lines of “good” and “bad” weren’t always clear, particularly from the perspective of an American, but that helps underscore the reality of war.

What really sold the film to me was the way that it ended. Because of the way the story is told, you’ve got an idea how things are going to turn out, but it’s the way the pieces are put together, along with additional revelations, that really make things come together. Some may consider the ending to be a little too mainstream, but it worked for me. And since it’s based on a true story, it’s hard to call it out on something that actually happened.

I’ve often complained about films that use gimmicks as a means of trying to make up for weaknesses in other areas, and it rarely works. Introducing elements like 3D and found footage rarely do anything to make a film better, and usually make it a lot worse. But I’ve got to say that I’m completely dumbfounded by the Whit Stillman gimmick, which is apparently to remove any semblance of a plot and fill it to overflowing with kitschy and unrealistic dialogue. I know that some people love this about his films, but I knew within a couple of minutes that I was going to hate Damsels in Distress.

Although it’s not really about anything, the film focuses on students at the Ivy League-ish Seven Oaks University. It’s the beginning of the school year, and Violet, Rose, and Heather (played by Greta Gerwig, Megalyn Megalyn Echikunwoke, and Carrie MacLemore, respectively) are returning students who have decided to bestow the gift of their accumulated wisdom upon a new arrival. They choose Lily (Analeigh Tipton), only to find that she’s not a freshman but has just transferred from another school. Nevertheless, their offer stands, and they quickly form a bond. And because the school has a housing shortage, they also become roommates.

The girls make a conscious effort to be helpful around campus. The university has a number of fraternities (which are identified with Roman letters rather than Greek, presumably because it’s more pretentious), and the girls see frat parties as a kind of youth outreach program in which they can help save the idiots from themselves. They also staff a campus suicide clinic, where their preferred therapy is dance, and Violet’s dream in life is to create a dance craze that can serve as a kind of global therapy.

It’s really difficult to concisely summarize what happens in Damsels in Distress because there really isn’t any kind of a plot. There is no challenge to be overcome or goal they’re trying to achieve (Violet’s dance craze idea kind of counts, I guess, but that idea isn’t even introduced until fairly late in the movie). It’s really just a collection of scenes that happen around a college campus and involve some of the most shallow and vapid people you’ll ever meet.

A big source of the appeal or frustration of the film lies in its quirky, unnatural dialogue. It seems the movie’s entire point is to be smug and pseudo-sophisticated with a holier-than-thou attitude, but without any real substance behind the quirky dialogue. It’s much like Juno or Clueless, except they managed to have some actual humor and a real story. The closest Damsels in Distress comes to comedy lies in a plot point in which a frat boy skipped kindergarten and never learned his colors. I didn’t find anything in the movie very funny, and there wasn’t much of to hold my interest at all.

This was the first Whit Stillman movie that I’ve seen, and I’ve heard the others generally have the same “weird dialogue and no plot” style. If you’ve seen and enjoyed other Whit Stillman films, then perhaps you’ll enjoy Damsels in Distress. I don’t feel a need to see any of his other films to learn whether I like them any better.

Shirley MacLaine has one of the greatest filmographies of any living actresses. She’s worked for directors like Alfred Hitchcock, Billy Wilder, and Hal Ashby, and starred opposite men like Jack Lemon, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Michael Caine, and John Forsythe. She’s been making great films since the 1950s, and while no one is going to claim that it’s on the same level as The Apartment or Irma la Douce or Gambit, her work in Bernie shows that she’s still got it.

Carthage is known as the best small town in Texas, and Bernie (played by Jack Black) is widely regarded as its most popular and beloved resident. He sings in the church choir, participates in most of the local plays, and he gets along well with everyone. But he gets along best with the little old ladies of the town. His day job as an assistant funeral director puts him in the lives of people under the worst of circumstances, where his skills as a people person help make the grief easier to bear. And his kindness doesn’t stop when he funeral is over, because he often visits recent widows to bring flowers or gift baskets to show he’s still thinking of them. People may occasionally question his sexual orientation, but never his standing as a genuinely nice person.

If Carthage has an anti-Bernie, then it would have to be Marjorie (Shirley MacLaine). She’s about as selfish as they come, running the town bank with an iron fist and a cold heart, and even her own family members have stopped talking to her after a lawsuit between her and her children. About the only one who could stand to be around her (and the only one that she could stand) was her husband, but when he died, she was all alone with her extraordinary wealth. She probably would have preferred it that way, but Bernie’s personality and post-funeral persistence somehow managed to break through her shell. They quickly became casual friends and then travel companions, and were soon inseparable. But Marjorie’s selfish bossyness quickly overpowered Bernie’s kindhearted serving nature, and she began to take advantage of him. He was too nice to stand up to her, but even the nicest man in the world has a breaking point.

The film is based on a true story, and is shot in a style that is half narrative and half pseudo-documentary. Interspersed with scenes in which the story plays out, we see interviews with the townspeople praising Bernie, disparaging Marjorie, and sharing small-town gossip. It’s very funny and thoroughly enjoyable, although there were a couple of times that the interview scenes felt like they were starting to become a little repetitive. There are a lot of opportunities for Jack Black to showcase his singing abilities, often in the form of hymns in church or at funerals, or showtunes in town plays, and this adds both to the comedy and authenticity of the film, but it also lends to its absurdity. The movie is not subtle in any way, and often goes over the top in everything that it does, but most of the time it has the intended effect of creating a charming witticism that avoids disaster and ends up with just the right degree of funny.

I hate movies that are fundamentally flawed. There are some films whose entire foundation can be completely destroyed by a single intelligent thought. For example, I was at least a little disappointed when I realized that all of Star Wars could have been avoided if the rebels had merely found some other way to transmit the Death Star plans than having to physically carry them from one place to another, but I’m willing to overlook that because it’s a great film despite its (admittedly numerous) flaws. But The Five-Year Engagement provides nothing to recover from its tragically senseless premise.

Tom (Jason Segel) first met Violet (Emily Blunt) at a New Year’s Eve costume party, where he was dressed as a bunny and she as Princess Diana. There was an instant connection and their romance grew over the year, and the next New Year’s Eve found them engaged. As they began planning their wedding, Violet was disappointed to learn that she did not get into the post-doctorate research program she’d applied to at UC Berkeley, but she was accepted into a similar program at the University of Michigan. Although he was horrified at the prospect of giving up his job as a chef at a prestigious San Francisco restaurant, he was outwardly supportive and didn’t show a moment’s hesitation at moving halfway across the country to support his soon-to-be wife.

For some reason that goes completely unexplained in the film, Tom and Violet are unable to get married before they leave, and they apparently don’t realize that people can also get married in Michigan. So they put on their mopey faces and put off their wedding for two years, until Violet’s program has ended and they can return to civilization. Because it seems that all Michiganians are completely devoid of culture, the best job Tom can find is making sandwiches at a deli, but he’ll hold out for two years for his beloved. But when Violet’s program is extended for another couple of years, the strength of their relationship begins to be tested.

The trailer for this movie made it seem like Tom and Violet would be separated for the duration of the engagement. If that had been the case, then their angst would have been justified and understandable, but because they are together the whole time, the entire premise of the film is completely demolished. There is absolutely no explanation for why they couldn’t just get married in Michigan (or in San Francisco before they left, or over any of the summers between the spring and fall semesters), and because they’re living together anyway and doing the kinds of things that married people do there’s no explanation for the sense of urgency they feel to tie the knot.

The movie is over two hours long and very slowly paced, so it feels almost as if you’re experiencing their five year engagement in real time. What little comedy there is has been spoiled by the trailer, so you’re left with a couple of hours of two whiny people who are frustrated with each other and the “horrible” circumstances in which they find themselves. The filmmakers even managed to completely waste their casting of Alison Brie as Violet’s sister and Jacki Weaver as her mother, and the bit parts for Mindy Kaling, Kevin Hart, Chris Parnell, and Molly Shannon are similarly squandered. Only Brian Posehn (in the role of Tom’s coworker at the deli) brings any degree of fun to the film outside of the main characters, but that’s far from enough to keep the film interesting.

Of all the films leading up to The Avengers, I loved Iron Man and Captain America, tolerated Iron Man 2, disliked The Incredible Hulk, and hated Thor. My problems with Thor stem both from the source of his power and his lack of heroism. I can buy into Iron Man because Tony Stark is a billionaire genius who’s been designing weapons all his life, and I can accept Captain America and The Hulk because both Steve Rogers and Bruce Banner were transformed by medical experiments intended to create super soldiers. But Thor is a god from another planet (who just happens to look human and speaks English with a British accent despite being a Norse god), which is illogical and doesn’t fit with the others. Further, while Iron Man and Captain America actively desire to protect others, The Hulk and Thor aren’t at all heroic and only fight when they themselves are attacked. I was truly disappointed to find that The Avengers not only focused heavily on the supernatural storyline initiated in Thor, but that it also dragged the others further into its absurdity.

The film opens in S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, where the mysterious Tesseract cube (which had been recovered by Howard Stark after Captain America sent it into the ocean during a battle with Red Skull) resides. The usually well-behaved cube has recently been acting up, and that’s because Loki (Thor’s adopted brother turned nemesis) is trying to use it to open an intergalactic portal so that he can invade with a newly-acquired alien army. Loki’s attempts are successful, and not only does he steal the Tesseract from S.H.I.E.L.D., but he even manages to use mind control to turn a couple of them (including Hawkeye and Dr. Selvig) against the others. If he succeeds in using the Tesseract to create a portal for the alien invaders, then Earth is done for.

Fortunately, Earth is not without protection. Captain America is more powerful than ever after having been thawed out of his arctic coma, and Iron Man is his normal arrogant self, but with the technology to back it up. The Black Widow also gets in on the action and helps to track down Bruce Banner. They don’t really want The Hulk, but Banner’s expertise in gamma radiation may be the only way they can find the Tesseract and the bad guys who have it. And of course Thor isn’t quite as stranded on his home planet as everyone (except of course for the audience) seemed to think. But even with their combined resources, along with the old standbys like Nick Fury and Agent Coulson, it’s not going to be an easy fight.

The Avengers isn’t a bad movie, and it does some things well. The Hulk is much more well represented in The Avengers than he was even in the whole movie dedicated to him, and although they can’t manage to find someone who wants that role for more than one movie, Mark Ruffalo gave a great performance. Similarly, Black Widow has a much bigger role, and her fighting style has become much more fun than the “strike a pose” approach taken in Iron Man 2, although it seemed out of character for her to appear terrified of The Hulk when nothing else seemed to rattle her at all. It’s also fun to see the characters working together and overcoming their differences to fight a common enemy, but it’s unfortunately also the case that they spent far too much time quarreling amongst themselves.

But there are also a number of disappointments in the film. There are times that it feels too much like The Transformers, with a race of alien robots heading toward Earth in search of a cube of unlimited power, and the technology they use in their fighting (and for everything else) is pretty unimpressive. Natalie Portman’s Jane character (sadly one of the best parts of Thor) is completely nonexistent, except for a single mention of how she’s been stashed away to be kept safe. Hawkeye apparently has the bow-and-arrow equivalent of an old west six-shooter that never runs out of ammo, until it does. Nick Fury is still almost completely worthless, as we sadly realize that he is basically middle management and not someone likely to do awesome things, and even see him mislead and lie to others in order to manipulate them. Similarly, the newly-introduced Agent Hill (played by Cobie Smulders) is pretty but completely inconsequential. Some of the action and dialogue is quite predictable, and if you know what’s about to come then seeing it happen just isn’t nearly as much fun. And while there are a number of very illogical elements in the film’s plot, they’re in areas of the film that I can’t really discuss without getting into spoilers.

Ultimately, my disappointment stems just as much from the film not living up to my expectations as from it being a weak movie. I had extremely high hopes for the film based on Joss Whedon’s involvement (with my excitement even higher after his recent The Cabin in the Woods), and based on the over-the-top excitement from those who’d already seen it. It would have been hard for any film to meet the expectations I had set for it, but I think that The Avengers has enough legitimate flaws to justify my mediocre-to-decent perception of it.

I try not to make generalizations when it comes to movies. Just when I come to the conclusion that I don’t like music documentaries, I come across something like Thunder Soul or The Weird World of Blowfly that I really enjoy. When I read a description of Last Days Here, it didn’t really sound like something that would appeal to me, but I had heard glowing endorsements from others about the film, so I decided to check it out. I’m glad to hear that other recent first-timers fell in love with it, but I was not as enamored with the film as I’d hoped I would be.

The heavy metal band Pentagram has been around on and off for over 40 years. And for virtually all of that time, lead singer Bobby Liebling has been taking drugs. Not just marijuana, but harder stuff like heroin, crack, and various kinds of pills. He’s logged over 50 trips to the hospital and has been on the verge of death so many times that even his parents (with whom he still lives) have a hard time getting worked up about it any more. He suffers from delusions and hallucinations, and on the increasingly rare occasions in which he’s lucid enough to play, he is so difficult to work with that Pentagram has many more former members than current ones.

But there’s something about Pentagram’s music that appeals to their dedicated fans. When Sean Pelletier, who worked for a small indie record label, first came across a Pentagram album around the year 2000, he was inspired enough to track down Liebling and found that they didn’t live too far apart. While Bobby was clearly on the road to killing himself through drug abuse, Sean held out hope that he could be saved by music. Perhaps if Pentagram could play again, Bobby could clean up his act enough to live a little longer and inspire a new generation of fans.

There is no denying that

Last Days Here

evoked just about as strong an emotional response as I’ve ever had to a documentary. But unfortunately that response is probably not what the filmmakers intended. I found Bobby so completely detestable and such an obviously lost cause that it was at times painful to watch. About the only fortunate aspect of his life for humanity in general is that his parents take care of him so he’s not collecting welfare, but that still doesn’t keep him from leeching off society in other ways.

I think that perhaps part of my aversion to the film lies in how Bobby’s changes affected my attitude toward and about him. It was easy to hate him when he was a complete waste with no redeeming quality of any kind, but if he did something to indicate that perhaps he may be capable of contributing something to society after all, I found myself strangely disappointed by that. I think that I somehow got more satisfaction from being able to completely write him off than from the idea that there may yet be hope for him, and I don’t like what that implies about me as a person. It’s a slippery slope on the path to watching reality television and professional wrestling that I’d rather stay as far away from as possible.

Every once in a while, a movie comes along which repeatedly surprises you with how bad it is. It’s not uncommon to encounter a movie with bad writing or a stupid premise, but they usually stay at about the same level of bad over the course of the whole film. It’s much rarer to see a movie that starts bad, but then continues to find new ways to get worse. Lockout starts out awful, and yet somehow it manages to take several big steps down in quality as it progresses.

It starts at some unspecified time in the future (although since we know that President Warnock is the 56th President, we can assume it’s probably no more than 100 years from now). We see motorcycles and helicopters that look a little different than they do now, but people aren’t driving flying cars or wearing jetpacks or using the metric system. People are still using guns to fight, and if they have important papers to carry around then they use the kinds of briefcases with combination locks. But there have apparently been advances in both space travel and prison design, because the height of supermax prisons is M. S. One, where society’s worst criminals do their time frozen in cryogenic chambers in a big jail in orbit around the Earth. Since they spend all their time as human ice cubes, there’s no chance for them to escape, but even if they did they’d be trapped in space.

But there are reports of the freezing process causing a kind of space dementia, so the President sends his daughter Emilie (Maggie Grace) to investigate. It is of course completely safe from her, since she’ll never even be in the same room as the inmates, nor will the criminals be in contact with anyone carrying weapons. Except of course for the secret service agent who for some reason deems it necessary to leave the First Daughter to be in the room with the hardened criminal, and to ignore the order to give up all his weapons. And in a completely unforeseeable turn of events, the criminal gets the secret service agent’s gun, kills him, un-freezes all of the other bad guys, and the inmates take Emilie and all the other guards and staff as hostages. The only one who can possibly save the day is Snow (played by Guy Pearce), who used to be a CIA agent before he was framed for murder and espionage.

The film starts with a ridiculous action sequence with some of the worst CGI I’ve ever witnessed. There were parts of a high-speed motorcycle chase that ended up looking much more like a hand-drawn cartoon than live action. But soon the horrible dialogue and inane plot caught up (or down) with the with the quality of the effects, and we end up with a terribly convoluted story that only gets worse as the film progresses. It’s like they had some not-so-clever action sequences they wanted to use in the movie and tried to piece together a story around them, and they ended up with a whole other plot line about trying to find the location of a hidden briefcase that is supposed to have the information needed to exonerate Snow. But these two plots aren’t well intertwined, so it’s like they stop caring about one whenever they’re in pursuit of the other.

Lockout is easily among the worst films I’ve seen this year, on par with Project X and Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie. The only thing Lockout has going for it is that it’s one that could be fun to watch with other people who get some sick pleasure from bad movies (and I’ll throw myself in that category much of the time), whereas the other two are simply bad all the way around. But I’m certainly not in the mood to test that theory by watching it again.

It’s not unusual to hear stories of “zero tolerance” policies at schools that cause a kid to be punished or even expelled because he included a butter knife in his lunch box or brought an action figure with a tiny toy gun. This is the kind of nanny state overreaction that is typical of our modern society, and it’s the same kind of flawed logic that prevents nail clippers and normal-sized shampoo bottles on airplanes. At best, these kinds of policies simply make it look like someone is trying to do something about the problem while simultaneously showing that they have no idea what the problem actually is.

When Ja’Maya Jackson brought a gun with her on the school bus, it was because she was tired of getting picked on by bigger kids. She was a rather normal-looking honor student who had been the victim of bullying on so many occasions that she just got tired of it. She didn’t shoot anyone, and the time she spent in a juvenile correctional facility was absolutely warranted as a result of her behavior, but had she been able to find help in some other way, perhaps there would have been a better outcome for all involved. She’s certainly not the first to feel the need to bring a gun to school to level the playing field against bigger kids, and some of those cases don’t end so peacefully.

But not all instances of bullying turn out this way. Many, like Alex Libby (a 12-year-old weakling from Sioux City, Iowa), simply take it and bottle up their emotions. Perhaps they try to tell someone about what’s going on, but all too often this doesn’t produce a very satisfying result. It certainly seems like his assistant principal has a very “boys will be boys” attitude and no real understanding of the degree to which Alex is being harassed, or perhaps even a wanton denial of what is painfully obvious to someone after watching only seconds of what he’s subjected to on a daily basis. And as bad as things seem for Alex, he’s at least able to shut himself down emotionally to the degree he’s able to tolerate it. For others, like Tyler Long or Ty Smalley, things got so bad they felt suicide was the only way out.

There are those who say that Bully is the kind of documentary that should be shown in every school. While I agree with that, it’s not for the reasons I expected. It’s hard to believe that anyone who is a bully will watch the film and see the error of his or her ways. And while it may be good for those who are perpetual victims of bullying to see that they’re not alone, but they probably already know that, and that knowledge by itself may not be all that comforting. However, I think that the best targets for this documentary are those in the middle, who aren’t themselves instigators or victims, but who may be swayed toward befriending those who often get bullied, or at least think twice about joining in. But it also seems to demonstrate the complete lack of understanding that some teachers and school administrators have about the severity of the problem, and could perhaps help them understand that it’s not something that’s healthy to ignore.

I found it interesting that all of the cases of bullying that were examined in this film were from relatively small towns. These aren’t inner-city kids from bad neighborhoods, but are from generally rural areas in Iowa, Oklahoma, Georgia, and Mississippi. Some of the schools did have police officers on campus, and some had cameras on the buses, but we didn’t see any metal detectors or overcrowding or violent gangs. I’m not entirely sure whether that always worked to the film’s advantage, since it’s kind of understandable (albeit still completely inexcusable) that “the gay kid” would be picked on in a school where there’s only one or two of them. It seems that had they shown at least once instance of bullying (or its result) in a big school, then people in that kind of environment may be better able to identify with at least that subject of the film.

Although there is apparently a PG-rated version of the film, I believe that the Alamo Drafthouse is showing the unrated cut. If that is indeed the case, it’s downright revolting that the MPAA ratings board threatened to give it an “R” classification for language. The only “bad word” I remember hearing in the film was “faggot”, but that was in the context of a kid telling someone else what he was called — we don’t even hear him called that. It’s merely used in a statement of fact, and seems like it would fit under the same umbrella as indigenous nudity as seen in films depicting African tribes. If the only reason you’re hesitant about seeing (or letting your kids see) the film is concern about it being unrated, you can rest assured that its content is far more tame than what you’ll see in The Hunger Games or Titanic 3D.

If you’ve ever seen Bugs Bunny cartoons, then you’re probably familiar with the idea of the Tasmanian devil, although you might not have realized that it’s a real thing. It’s also called the Tasmanian tiger, and it’s a sleek cat with a striped back that is apparently a pretty vicious killer. Unfortunately, though, they’re believed to be extinct.

But maybe not. The biotech company Red Leaf has reason to believe that there’s at least one still alive and roaming about the Tasmanian wilderness, and they also believe that there’s something special about its DNA that could be extremely valuable to them if they were able to obtain a sample to study. It’s also something that could be extremely valuable to their competitors, so if they can’t get it for themselves, then they want to ensure that no one else gets it either. And that’s why they’ve called in expert hunter Martin David (played by Willem Dafoe) to track down the devil if it exists, get blood and tissue samples, and then destroy the animal to keep it out of the hands of their competitors. There’s a lot of money on the line, so they’re willing to take a very relaxed approach to things like laws and ethics.

Martin made his way to Tasmania under the guise of a biologist who intends to conduct research in the vast wilderness where they have all kinds of exotic creatures that don’t exist anywhere else on the planet. His contact put him in touch with Jacky Mindy (played by Sam Neill) to act as a guide, and Sam directed him to a cabin where he could rent a room for the duration of his trip. Martin quickly learned that this wasn’t going to be a luxurious trip, with amenities like electricity and hot water hard to come by, and locals not exactly rolling out the red carpet for visitors. There’s a battle going on between loggers and environmentalists, so everyone is just a little bit more on edge than normal.

The marketing material for this film was (probably intentionally) reminiscent of the recent Liam Neeson film The Grey, but the content was quite different. For one thing, The Grey was an exciting thriller with lots of action and suspense, while The Hunter was much slower, less exciting, and more predictable. Dafoe’s character spends more time babysitting than he does hunting, but even the scenes in which he’s out in the wilderness leave something to be desired. There’s more “waiting for something to happen” in the film than I would like, which I’m sure is what hunting is really like but doesn’t make for a very riveting movie.

It’s also hard to get excited about much that happens during the film. The audience has more knowledge about what’s going on than Martin does, so when something happens which he doesn’t expect, it’s less a surprise for us, and it’s harder to sympathize with him. I suppose that it’s kind of fitting that the film has an unsatisfying ending, because everything else in the movie is so low-key that it’s not as much of a let-down as it might have otherwise been.

There are many sports documentaries that cover a team over the course of a season, and they always seem like a real gamble because past results don’t guarantee future performance. I wonder how many filmmakers have had their hopes dashed when they start covering what should be an unstoppable force only to have their first “off” season in years. It’s even riskier to film the underdog, because they’re expected to lose. A film like Quantum Hoops (about the historically awful Caltech basketball team) would probably still be very good even if the team performed down to everyone’s expectations, but Undefeated would not have been the film it was if the team hadn’t made a dramatic reversal when the cameras were rolling.

Manassas High School is located in a particularly run-down area of North Memphis. The poverty rate is as high as the crime rate, and few kids are lucky enough to grow up with both parents around to care for them. Most people who grow up there don’t have any hope of college or of getting a decent job. The school is strapped for cash, and the only way they can afford to have a football team is that richer schools with much better teams actually pay the Manassas Tigers to play them for what’s sure to be an easy win. That was the norm when Bill Courtney came to coach six years ago, and he certainly didn’t turn things around right away. But in whatever season the film covered (I’m guessing it was 2009 or 2010, but I don’t think they mentioned it), things were looking up for them. They had a couple of great seniors, including O.C. Brown, who was able to run through just about any opposition thanks to his combination of size and speed, and Montrail “Money” Brown (who I’m pretty sure is not related to O.C.), whose intelligence allows him to overcome his size disadvantage. They were also getting back Charvis Daniels, a promising player who had missed the previous season because he was in jail. The Tigers had never won a playoff game in the school’s history, but perhaps they had the right team to finally make it over that hurdle.

The team’s first game of the season makes it obvious that the title doesn’t refer to a lossless record, but rather it’s the more sappy “our spirits won’t be defeated” sense of the word, but even that doesn’t really hold for everyone. They have a number of challenges to overcome, and more than one occasion in which someone is ready to throw in the towel. Coach Courtney is clearly not the most eloquent of speakers, and some of his pearls of wisdom don’t actually make any sense if you think about them too carefully. But it’s clear that he and the other coaches really care for the players and go the extra mile to ensure that they’re in a position to succeed in life in addition to on the field.

Undefeated recently won the Academy Award for best documentary, and while it may well be the best of the films that were nominated (although I can’t say that authoritatively, since the only other nominee I’ve seen was the very disappointing Pina), but it’s hard to call it the best documentary of the year with films like Senna and Tabloid not even nominated for some reason. Undefeated is not always easy to watch, and it skirts around some touchy subjects, but it comes together so well in the end that it’s easy to forgive the sometimes rocky path it took to get there.