Physical humor always funny
Alex Bethke
Issue date: 4/9/08 Section: Juice
Leatherheads is a throwback movie in more ways than one. Not only is it about professional football in 1925, but it's also a slapstick comedy. A slapstick comedy is defined by answers.com as a type of comedy characterized by broad humor, absurd situations and vigorous, often violent action (e.g., a character being hit in the face with a frying pan or running full speed into a wall). The style is common to those genres of entertainment in which the audience suspends their belief of natural laws.
Old Charlie Chaplin films or The Three Stooges are the legendary faces of the genre. It's a genre that I feel isn't done very well, or often anymore, but George Clooney pulls it off nicely with his third attempt at directing. (Clooney has also directed Good Night, and Good Luck and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind.)
The story starts out in Duluth, Minn., which is home of the Duluth Bulldogs. Clooney plays Dodge Connelly, the aging team captain whose life is football. The season is just getting started when the Bulldogs, and several other teams in the league, go broke and can no longer afford to pay their players. Several of the players go back to their deadbeat jobs. Dodge, knowing no other trait than football, sets out to save the league.
Dodge hears over the radio that Princeton all-star and war-hero Carter "The Bullet" Rutherford (John Krasinski, The Office, License to Wed) attracted more than 40,000 fans to a college game. So Dodge heads to Chicago to convince Carter to quit paying tuition to play football and start getting paid to play football. The conquest is a success, and Carter joins the Bulldogs, saving the team and perhaps the league.
Meanwhile, the quick-witted Chicago Tribune reporter Lexie Littleton (Renée Zellweger, Chicago, Bridget Jones's Diary) is trying to write a story claiming Carter is no war hero at all. Being as beautiful as she is, it's not hard for her to get Carter to trust her. However, she also catches Dodge's eye, creating the classic love triangle.
Old Charlie Chaplin films or The Three Stooges are the legendary faces of the genre. It's a genre that I feel isn't done very well, or often anymore, but George Clooney pulls it off nicely with his third attempt at directing. (Clooney has also directed Good Night, and Good Luck and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind.)
The story starts out in Duluth, Minn., which is home of the Duluth Bulldogs. Clooney plays Dodge Connelly, the aging team captain whose life is football. The season is just getting started when the Bulldogs, and several other teams in the league, go broke and can no longer afford to pay their players. Several of the players go back to their deadbeat jobs. Dodge, knowing no other trait than football, sets out to save the league.
Dodge hears over the radio that Princeton all-star and war-hero Carter "The Bullet" Rutherford (John Krasinski, The Office, License to Wed) attracted more than 40,000 fans to a college game. So Dodge heads to Chicago to convince Carter to quit paying tuition to play football and start getting paid to play football. The conquest is a success, and Carter joins the Bulldogs, saving the team and perhaps the league.
Meanwhile, the quick-witted Chicago Tribune reporter Lexie Littleton (Renée Zellweger, Chicago, Bridget Jones's Diary) is trying to write a story claiming Carter is no war hero at all. Being as beautiful as she is, it's not hard for her to get Carter to trust her. However, she also catches Dodge's eye, creating the classic love triangle.
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