Inert 'Marshall' aims to inspire

Cast member Matthew McConaughey attends the premiere of 'We are Marshall' at the Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood December 14, 2006. (Phil McCarten/Reuters)

"We Are Marshall" is a football movie that isn't really about football, yet somehow manages to perpetuate every cliche of the genre.

Based on the true story of the 1970 Marshall University team, which lost most of its players, coaches and several community leaders in a plane crash, the movie certainly has its heart in the right place, but that alone just isn't enough.

Director McG, known for the whiz-bang acrobatics of his "Charlie's Angels" movies, applies a warm, shiny veneer to everything here which prevents any emotion from getting through. There's none of his trademark elan here, except perhaps for the unexpected choice of Crosby Stills & Nash's "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" during the obligatory training montage.

To paraphrase the first line of that song, it's getting to the point where he's no fun anymore. Anyone could have directed this movie.

We see the people of Huntington, W.Va., grieving — we just can't feel it. The script from Jamie Linden, with a story-by credit for Cory Helms (both first-timers), tells us that football is everything in this town instead of showing us. Aside from Anthony Mackie's character, we barely get to know any of the players, either those who missed the flight or those who were recruited to continue the program, nearly all of them freshmen.

And yet the film intends to uplift with all the typical swelling music and rousing speeches, most of which come from Matthew McConaughey, whose idea of serious acting apparently consists of hunching over, talking out of the side of his mouth and mixing plaids with stripes.

McConaughey stars as Jack Lengyel, the coach who volunteered to take over the Thundering Herd after the crash when no one else wanted the gig. It is a different role for him - he doesn't get to just bandy about that good-old-boy charm of his - but what he does in trying to appear nerdy and goofy simply seems mannered and distractingly self-conscious.

One of the few coaches left, because he got into a car that night instead of boarding the plane after an away game, is Red Dawson, played by an equally dehunked Matthew Fox, star of "Lost." Red is, understandably, riddled with guilt that he lived when so many others didn't; Jack cajoles him into coming back anyway.

Also among the surprisingly solid supporting cast, who manage some dignity despite being saddled with overly simplistic, heart-tugging things to say, are David Strathairn as Marshall's president and Ian McShane as a member of the school's board of directors whose son, the star running back, died in the crash. And Kate Mara co-stars as the cheerleader who was engaged to marry the running back.

Mara, the granddaughter of late New York Giants owner Wellington Mara, is probably the most authentic football source in the entire movie through sheer DNA, and except for one strong scene with McShane, she gets little more to do than look pretty while she grieves.

"We Are Marshall," a Warner Bros. Pictures release, is rated PG for emotional thematic material, a crash scene and mild language. Running time: 125 minutes. One and a half stars out of four.