Saturday's Hero

I saw this film in 1951 when I was in high school. It was really depressing to some extent. It showed how the players were recruited and used only for the sake of football. I can somewhat remember how Steve was injured and how they gerry rigged a shoulder pad so he could play while injured. I also remember how he was rather a bright student in the class room. I only wish I could purchase the DVD or the VHS of this movie. I am not sure if it has ever been put out in that format. I think the movie when seen will seem like it just happened yesterday in that the situation in college football hasn't changed much over the last fifty years.

Steve Novak (John Derek) comes from a Polish-American immigrant family in a small mill town. He gets a chance to go to play college football. His father is eager to have one of his sons escape the mill. He falls for Melissa (Donna Reed), the daughter of a wealthy school benefactor.

This is not the hardest hitting of college football expose movie. It has a few hard hits. Mostly, it shows that football is more important than everything else in the college world. There are a couple of big-ish names in the lead. Every knows Donna Reed. I know John Derek more as an 80's B-movie director with his sexpot wife. He has a fine face for a second-tier leading boy which fits this role very well. The football action is mostly fine and seem to be running at full speed. They do spend a lot of time on the field. All in all, this is fine as it tries to take a serious look at the college football world.

You know how media always likes to portray the current outrage -- in this case Big Money corrupting college football - as just having been hatched recently?

Yah, well, feast your eyes on Saturday's Hero. Within the first five minutes we meet the local sportswriter acting as a player agent (illegal), alumni/boosters paying to attract players (illegal) and a high school star who insists he's gonna study as if he's pursuing a legitimate degree (extremely unlikely outside the Ivy League) and the recruiter who pretty much laughs in his face.

Kid heads off to Jackson A&M Polytech, where he goes to orientation (full of Polyanna rules), meets his jaded faculty advisor (English prof who hates the fraud of ''student/athlete"), gets assigned a ''no show'' job, meets his new teammates and gets one brief speech from the hard-bitten head coach who basically tells them they're all nobodies. Next time we coach he's telling the team doc to shoot up John Derek the star player with novocaine so he goes back in the game despite obviously having a broken clavicle or dislocated shoulder. We learn later he was hit by an opposition player who admitted they put a bounty on Derek (take him out by injuring him) which is something that came to light under Sean Payton and the New Orleans Saints. Then we get Mr. Bigtime Booster who pretty much controls the coach and pressures Derek to playing despite being seriously hurt. And then he loses his scholarship, just like Nick Saban pulls the scholarships of players he promised full rides to at Alabama.

The sportswriter-cum-player agent actually lobbies for players to be paid out of the obscene profits the college rakes in on football. In 1951! It only took another 71 seasons for the NCAA to fold under Congressional pressure to allow players to benefit from their Names, Images and Likeness. Progress!!

Despite the hard-hitting subject matter, it comes across as A Very Special After School Special. Certainly doesn't help that John Derek is a total stiff and Donna Reed (who I adore) simply does not excite me here. And the players come across as amateur actors (to be charitable).

The key quote is from the cynical player who suffered the career-ending injury: ''Look kid, do they let people in to see the games for free? It's a racket." That guy knew the score.

One question: Why do these sports movies about guys who come out of Palookaville, NJ, always feature immigrant families who talk pidgen-English? Just once I want pops to be a high school math teacher fourth-generation Quaker.

This movie was shown on a cable film channel a few years back. Most films made during this time period that dealt with sports either were humorous or light hearted with a little bit of drama thrown in. Saturday's Hero looks at a local high school football star played by John Derek who comes somewhat from the wrong side of the tracks so to speak. The local college successfully recruits him to play for them on a scholarship. He accepts their offer and begins playing and the team soars with him as its star then something happens which changes everything.

Although the film came out in 1951 it surprisingly is not dated in its subject matter. When movies about football are thought of The Longest Yard, M*A*S*H, SemiTough, North Dallas Forty, Knute Rockne All American, The Program, All the Right Moves, Everybody's All American are some which come to mind. Don't however over look this early 50's film about college football and the sometimes-nasty business behind it.

I just watched this film on AMC on a rare Tuesday off of work. I was surprised at how good it was. What struck me first was the cinematography, outstanding! Lee Garmes really understood how to frame a football game and uses some innovative mobile camera work to take you right into the action. His camera angles are very similar to ones you see covering football today and I wonder if he was a pioneer in this effort.

The story flowed well and kept you interested. It's somewhat disheartening that the underlying thread in the story (the dark (money)side of big time college football) is still so relevant. When Aldo Ray's character say's to John Derek's character "...do you think the fans get in for free?, It's a racket..." and you consider it is 1951 you wonder at how far we have really come.