"He Got 'Game'"
by Scott Mantz

"The Greatest Game Ever Played"
Shia LaBeouf, Stephen Dillane
Directed by Bill Paxton

A real swinger! Shia LaBeouf and Josh Flitter get ready for "The Greatest Game Ever Played"

Before you read this review for “The Greatest Game Ever Played” – the real-life story about 20-year-old Francis Ouimet’s incredible victory at the 1913 US Open – there’s something you should know…

I couldn’t care less about golf.  It’s just not my thing.  It’s so bad that when I was a kid, I thought that Jack Nicklaus and Jack Nicholson were the same person.  And the closest I ever came to picking up a club was when I tried to impress a girl at a miniature golf course back in the early 80’s.  Needless to say, she wasn’t impressed.

To that extent, that makes me either the best person or the worst person in the world to weigh in with an opinion about a golf movie – especially one that’s based on a true story.  For while I may not know a heck of a lot about the gentleman’s sport or some of the more defining moments in its history, I sure know a good movie when I see one.

Fortunately, “The Greatest Game Ever Played” is a good movie – not a great movie, mind you, but a good one.  For his second turn behind the camera after 2002’s morbid, disturbing thriller “Frailty,” actor-turned-director Bill Paxton (“Twister,” “Apollo 13”) pulls a stylistic 180 for a charming, inspirational crowd-pleaser that’s right on par with the Disney mold.

And like other recent Disney films “The Rookie” and “Miracle,” “Greatest Game” is a fact-based underdog story about a dreamer who defied the odds.  In this case, that dreamer is Francis Ouimet (Shia LaBeouf), a former caddie and working class kid from Massachusetts who took on reigning British champion Harry Vardon (Stephen Dillane) at the 1913 US Open.  Vardon never expected to go the distance with such a young unknown, but in the process, the rules of the game were changed forever, and Ouimet proved that anything is possible if you set your mind to it.

Paxton sets his directorial ambitions high from the outset during an animated opening credits sequence that could have come right out of the 1968 Beatles classic “Yellow Submarine.”  He also makes effective use of his early 20th century production values to illustrate the class divisions of the time, while the technique that Robert Redford used in “The Legend of Bagger Vance” – where the camera follows the game from the ball’s point-of-view – is utilized to a more dramatic effect.

The problem is that for all the drama that ensues when Ouimet takes the course, the film is caught in a sandtrap by weak character development and an uneven tone.  Despite excellent performances by the charismatic Shia LaBeouf (“Holes”), the classy Stephen Dillane (“The Hours”) and young scene-stealer Josh Flitter (who plays LaBeouf’s 10-year-old caddie), the film never rises above being a conventional biopic with clichéd supporting characters.

But that’s not to say that “The Greatest Game Ever Played” isn’t worth seeing – it most certainly is, and there’s a lot to admire whether you’re a fan of the game or not.  It may not be the best golf movie ever made – I’ve always been more partial to “Caddyshack” (and not because of the golf!) – but it will definitely keep you engaged right up to the 18th hole.

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