RSS
Home
Review - The Damned United
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
The Damned United is a rare thing, a sports film where knowledge of the game on screen isn’t necessary or even important. Michael Sheen is Brian Clough, one of England’s all-time great soccer/football coaches. He is cocky, talks down to his players and bosses around his own bosses. Clough also wins, sugar-coating all his nastiness. Based on David Pearce’s novel, United skips between two time periods, with drastically different results in its character’s lives.
The first features a young Clough, striving to prove himself at Derby County, a low-level team with little in expectations, think Britain’s Kansas City Royals. Along with his coaching assistant Peter Taylor (Timothy Spall), Clough takes a group of nobodies, and a few forgotten talents overlooked by everyone else, and turns them into winners. While that may sound like a common sports cliche, even if such a thing plays out every year, director Tom Hooper and Peter Morgan aren’t interested in these elements. They are interested in Clough and the way his biting personality pokes and prods people around him.
This is especially apparent in the picture’s second story, where a celebrated Clough becomes the new leader of Leeds United, a major franchise. Leeds has been a champion multiple times and its former coach Don Revie (Colm Meaney) isn’t keen on the new guy in town, having built up a rivalry over the years. Clough’s view of the situation is fascinating. He loathes his new players and means to undo all the ways of his predecessor. Clough despises Revie, even if the latter barely even notices. This is a one-sided grudge.
Sheen is wonderful as usual. He has seemingly perfected the art of playing iconic men of the latter 20th century. His Clough may be even better than his David Frost or Tony Blair, since United allows him to be a man of forthright emotions, either blaring a cheshire-cat grin or grimacing as if his life depended on it. Sheen can bring big dramatic gestures to a picture without overdoing them, a true feat. Equally as impressive is Spall, an often used and under-appreciated actor who brings a warmth to the film. The two men’s friendship is rife with ecstatic highs and bitter lows, and while we may root for them to win the big match, we want them to enjoy a pint at the end of the day together more.
Morgan, who has been one of the hottest screenwriters of recent years for his work on The Deal, The Queen and Frost/Nixon (all starring Sheen), presents a welcoming picture. Those unfamiliar with corner-kicks and red-flags need not worry, United is easy to follow. Hooper, coming off the award-winning “John Adams” mini-series, directs with a soft touch. He frames the verbal scrapes like a boxing match, with his combatants barking cheap-shots. The one major element of the movie that struggles may be a key one. For all of the shouting and boasting Clough does, one never gets a true sense of what made him such an accomplished coach. He is a fascinating person to watch but in moments where the sports take center stage, you are left scratching your head over why this man was thought of as a genius.
The Damned United opens at Landmark’s Seven Gables Theater and the AMC Loews Uptown 3 tomorrow.
Related Articles:
Add a Comment
