The University of Texas’ fabled national championship run of 1969 is well known among sports circles. That title game against the University of Arkansas was so anticipated, that the President of the United States Richard Nixon attended the game. Athletic historians have since called it one of the game’s greatest contests. A big part of that championship drive and victory was Freddie Steinmark and finally, thanks to My All American, his inspirational story is being told.
Finn Wittrock (soon to be seen in The Big Short) stars as Steinmark, an unlikely football star from Colorado who we meet as an overachieving high school baller that has his future all planned out. He’s going to graduate, go to the University of Colorado and then play for the Denver Broncos. But, the scholarship offers are few and far between. See, he’s somewhat small for the game. But, what he lacks in height, he makes up for in effort, hustle and talent.
His coach passes along his game tapes to Coach Darrell Royal (Aaron Eckhart) at UT and Royal brings him and his fellow football star BFF from Colorado to Austin offers them a full ride. Steinmark’s dream of a pro football career still has life. Once at UT, he has to prove himself and before long does what nobody before him has done, made the starting lineup as a sophomore. His fellow teammates take inspiration from his tenacity and before long the team that was below average is competing for a national title.
Eckhart is his usual awesome self (The Movie Mensch is a big fan, full disclosure!) and portrays the football patriarch of the Texas Longhorns in the late 60s through a sequence with him as an older man recalling Steinmark. His relaying the story of the subject of the film bookends the film from an opening sequence with him telling a reporter about the best All-American that wasn’t an All-American to its closing moments where he finishes the story and puts the seal of history on our journey.
Angelo Pizzo wrote and directed My All American, based on the book by Jim Dent and does a solid enough job, although it is hardly his fault that there are so many sports movie clichés that are almost unavoidable due to the fact that this is a true story. Pizzo wrote Rudy and Hoosiers and there are elements of both films in his directorial methods. Perhaps that’s why the clichés come so easily, or perhaps they truly are unavoidable in a true tale sports movie.
Wittrock is a surprisingly good anchor to this film. It takes an actor of serious mettle to carry an entire movie on their shoulders. He carries My All American and inhabits this little hero with a big heart impeccably. The problem with My All American is not his and our issues with the film make us feel a big jaded, sadly. We’ve seen this story before. Sure, it’s unique as it is Steinmark’s journey and it’s sad and tragic what happened to him that cut his life short. But, there had to be a way to avoid so many of the potholes of sports movie bios that My All American falls into.
That said, it is still an inspiring tale. My All American will still make you want to go out and tackle life with a verve that is beyond what you’ve done before. Perhaps we are jaded, but it’s just a lesson in life is short that hits the same notes that we’ve heard before — most brilliantly on TV, ironically, in Brian’s Song.
Grade: B-