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Trader Woes

The recent success of "Moneyball" showed that a story focused solely on the business behind professional sports can be compelling enough to carry a movie. While "Jerry Maguire" and "Any Given Sunday" may have dipped their toes in that water, in both cases their stories were rounded-out with enough romantic subplots, interpersonal conflict, and on-field action to make the backroom wheeling and dealing a secondary plot point. With "Draft Day", screenwriters Scott Rothman and Rajiv Joseph, with their first feature script, opted to follow the "Moneyball" model and, while they didn't quite achieve the same success, their effort to capture the tension, pressure, and conflict in sports franchise's front office generally works.

"Draft Day" is the story of Sonny Weaver, Jr. (Kevin Costner, "Field of Dreams", "For Love of the Game"), General Manager of the hard-luck Cleveland Browns, and his decision about which college player to pick in the first round of the NFL Draft. Mr. Weaver, under immense pressure from team owner Anthony Molina (played with appropriate gruffness by the ever-menacing Frank Langella, "Frost/Nixon") to "make a splash", agrees to a knee-jerk trade that he immediately regrets, setting up the rest of the movie as he tries to spin his sow's ear decision into a silk purse.

Limited solely within the temporal confines of the day of the actual draft, director Ivan Reitman ("Ghostbusters", duh) keeps the tension building through constant use of a clock counting down the hours and minutes to the opening of the draft and repeated shouting that, "We're on the clock!" Adding to the tension is the Browns' newly-hired Coach Penn (Denis Leary, "The Amazing Spiderman"), who vehemently disagrees with every decision that Weaver is making and isn't too shy to shout about it. Unfortunately, Reitman seems uncomfortable with the tight scope of the screenplay. There are no explosions, no location changes, no broad comedic bits, no quick-cuts, no flashbacks - nothing but straightforward dialog. His one attempt to jazz things up - a stylized over-lapping split-screen effect - quickly becomes tiresome and distracting.

The other big issue with "Draft Day" is the concessions that the script has to make to get the blessing of the NFL. In order to use the names of real teams, real players, Chris Berman, etc, the story has to be so white-washed and soft-shoed that it's hard to reconcile it with the NFL that we see and hear about in the news. For instance, in this film, we have a quarterback-prospect whose biggest flaw might be that his teammates might not have shown-up to his 21st birthday party. Sure, there's a lot to be said for team chemistry, but that's pretty tame stuff. On the other hand, you can go gritty and not get the blessing of the NFL, and then you get the aforementioned "Any Given Sunday", with its Miami Sharks, Dallas Knights, and Texas Rattlers, so there's really no winning.

"Draft Day" does have the benefit of a great supporting cast. Weaver's underdeveloped love interest Ali is played by the a smirking and soft-eyed Jennifer Garner ("Ghosts of Girlfriends Past"). Ms. Garner and Mr. Costner's scenes together have great chemistry, even if they are only window dressing. It's also refreshing to see Ali's character written and played as a strong and independent woman, instead of the emotional insecure stereotype that she could have been in a lazier film. The rest of the film is peopled by an impressive array of character actors including Patrick St. Esprit, Wade Williams, Kevin Dunn, Brad William Henke, W. Earle Brown, and Wallace Langham, to name a few. One of the fun parts of this movie is sticking around to see who turns up next - including a few great cameos. Ellen Burstyn ("Requiem for a Dream") also does a nicely nuanced job as Weaver's pushy mother with a heart of gold. That said, this movie lives or dies with Kevin Costner's performance and, while he brings nothing new to the table, he wears this part like a comfortable shirt and this is one of those times that approach works perfectly. Moviegoers know exactly what to expect and he delivers it well.

Ultimately, though, enjoyment of this movie will depend on your appreciation of the Kevin-Costner-Sports-Movie sub-genre. As far as that goes, it can't contend with "Field of Dreams" or "Bull Durham", falls a bit short of "Tin Cup" and "For Love of the Game", but it beats the tar out of "American Flyers". Ultimately, that's all you need to know.