The Great Debaters

(dir. Denzel "The original Idris Elba" Washington)

Well, we've had all kinds of sport/ groundbreaker/ race-related feel-good dramas over the past couple years, from Something the Lord Made (first heart surgery, orchestrated by a black doctor- Mos Def's performance almost balancing out that awful Be Kind Rewind shit!), to that overlong Ken Burns --yeah, I know it's a redundancy--doc about Jack Johnson (first black boxing champion {not the stoner folk singer} ), to Glory Road (first black-athlete endorsed basketball sneaker, or something), to that other Denzel flick about the integrated football team (forgot the name, truly not worth imdb'ing), and now, here we are, presented with a historical drama about the first integrated College Debate Team Match. Boy, Hollywood really running out of historical firsts, aren't they?

Now before I tear into this flick, let me first assure the reader that I'm not totally dismissive of the "Based a True Story" genre-- I'm willing to allow some embellishment for the sake of drawing out a historical curiosity into a feature film (A Beautiful Mind, Apollo 13, heck, all of Opie Cunningham's ouvre-- pretty decent entertainment). But stuff like this Debater schlock truly leaves you feeling used-- because Mr. Washington decides to hit every cheap sentimental note he can to just cheesify beyond redemption what is in essence a compelling tale on its own. This is especially disappointing because Denzel's directorial debut, Antowan Fisher , showed a reasonable level of character depth, modesty of storytelling, and dramatic/ emotional restraint, and seemed to indicate that 'Zel had a promising, Robert Redford-Ordinary People/ A River Runs Through it- esque directing career ahead of him (sophisticated melodrama). Sadly, The Great Debaters, although not a terrible film, is a decided step back to Hollywood tripe.

So here's the foundation of the story (of which I'd love to see a documentary): a smalltown Texas black college forms a Debate team under the tutelage of a renowned poet/ professor/ unionist rabblerouser, , goes undefeated against larger, more renowned colleges, builds enough of a reputation to begin competing against white colleges, and ultimately goes toe-to-toe with the revered Harvard Debate Team.

And here's just a sampling of the sugar-coating: a nauseating romance between the composed, idealistic female student and the "bad boy" local who alternately quotes Joyce verbatim and swigs straight whiskey at underground juke joints (brilliant, dangerous, and negro-- take that, Lord Byron!), a bright young scholar in the shadow of his stately minister father, a music-montage of the team running off umpteen victories in a row (complete with flying-newspaper headlines reflecting their rise!), a surprise twist before the big Harvard match that forces one teammate to overcome his limitations, fish-out-of-water moments for our rustic heroes in the bustling streets and swank hotel rooms of Boston, a climactic speech that plays on the "foreshadowing" of what we've seen in the past hour and half... you get the point.

So all in all, some decent performances aside (the young stud who plays the rebel-scholar has a bright future transitioning into street dancing-gang movies, I'm sure), and a handful of literary references (Langston Hughes, H.D Thoreau) for the English majors, I rate the movie at 3 stars for story potential, 1 for execution, and thus: