On the 26th day of my 34 Days of Oscar, I saw the movie "Undefeated". This movie has been nominated this year for an Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary.
"Undefeated" is the story of the 2009 season of the Memphis area Manassas Tigers. The Tigers are a High School football team coached for the past few years by Bill Courtney. Before Bill Courtney's arrival as the football coach 6 years ago, the Tigers were arguably the worst High School football team in the state. They were so bad, that other schools would pay Manassas $3000 a game just to play them so their school can have a practice game. The Manassas Tigers have existed for over 104 years and have never won a single playoff game before. The camera follows Bill as he not only
tries to turn his men into football players, but keep them in school and possibly help them get into college. There are 3 football players that get the most screen time: OC is the kid who has the talent to get into a lot of colleges but his grades are so low that no colleges are asking. Money is the small but smart and determined kid who just wants to make it to college. Chavis is the hothead defensive star who's temperament might gt him kicked off the team if he doesn't pull it together. Coach Courtney has to unite all of players and try to give the town of Manassas at least 1 winning football season just to show everyone that hard work does pay off.
I thought "Undefeated" was a great documentary. I am a football fan, so I found everything extremely interesting. I liked how the focus wasn't just on football, but on academics. There are several emotional scenes in this film that won't leave a dry eye in the house. This is one of the better documentaries I have seen this year, but I'm not sure if it will win the Academy Award or not. I only wish that there would have been more interviews with the students. Only OC and Money expressed thoughts to the camera at times. I also would have liked this movie to focus on more than just 3 kids. There are a lot more kids on the team and we never even knew what some of their names were.
Also, I have a small quibble with the title. The Tigers lose their very first game of the season, so they are not really "Undefeated" are they!
Overall, I give "Undefeated" 3.5 out of 5 stars. I thought it was a well made documentary and certainly deserved it's nomination for an Academy Award. I wish they had made more an an attempt to involve more students in this movie and get their point of view though. It was an almost perfect documentary, but it still misses the mark by a little.
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