Has Redeeming Qualities

dansview

OK already! The debate scenes don't reflect true-to-life college debating environments. The characters were clichéd and one dimensional. Some of it is preachy. I grant you all that, other reviewers. But first of all, what a cool concept for a movie...a debate team at Pepperdine. I love it. I consider myself creative, but I could never have come up with that idea. Score one for the screenwriter, or whomever pitched the idea. Roy Scheider is so appealing on screen. I love that guy. I understand he was a Liberal in real life. I don't care. I still like him.His best scene is when he tells a story about his mother. Kirk Cameron's best scene is when he is trying to get his debate partner and date to loosen up in his dorm room. He played it with down-to-earth realism and sincerity. The biggest mistake of the film is Cameron's accent. Why not just make his character be from a small town in Eastern Oregon, OR hire an actor who is actually from Oklahoma or Texas?? His earnest attempt to do the accent drew away from his effort to portray the other aspects of his character. Abortion?? Come on. College kids debating that before the Supreme Court in the late 80s? What a lazy choice. It was like the writer or the film makers didn't want to rack their brains a bit and come up with something more original. That choice kind of ruined the film for me, although I realize that the whole Jami Gertz character was based on it's tie to this issue. Wow, Tim Quill nailed the noblesse oblige patrician with a hankering for the written word. But can't you be both a politician and a writer at the same time, or maybe write, before or after a political career? His character was choosing between the two career paths, but maybe he didn't need to. The politician Fred Grandy was an actor on the Love Boat before politics. Fred Thompson combined the two. Law and Order and politics. So I don't buy the conflict. Get rid of the sketch artist. I didn't get it at all. There is a kid who keeps sketching the people we see, but he never speaks. It was gratuitous. I loved the use of the classic 80s tune "Forever Young," set to a driving sequence on the Pacific Coast Highway, as well as the Celine Dion opening track, long before her fame. Watch it for its' camp, for the early resume of Gertz and Cameron, for the beach setting, and for the unique plot vehicle, college debating.

score 6/10

dansview 25 December 2012

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2724843/