Yesterday's Hero

British-Australian co-production has former football (soccer) star Ian McShane, grizzled, out-of-shape and boozing, offered a comeback opportunity; he gets support from football club chairman Paul Nicholas and his girlfriend, pop singer Suzanne Somers, who once had a fling with McShane during his glory years. Would-be feel-good drama (written by Jackie Collins, of all people!) with schizophrenic ingredients, such as the overlong disco numbers which come butting into the narrative like television commercials. A decent actor, McShane gives the picture whatever interest it has; there is no energy, and the plot comes to a foregone conclusion. Somers, wearing clothes "from her closet", seems to have been beamed in from an entirely different program (as if two TV stations got jammed together). A dogged underachiever, one that went unreleased in the States despite Suzanne's popularity at the time from "Three's Company". *1/2 from ****

One of those films so utterly banal and predictable as to be almost enjoyable on that account alone, the soccer world of Yesterday's Hero seems now nearly as distant as that of the superior Arsenal Stadium Mystery of forty years earlier. A time when virtually all weekend games kicked off at 15.00 on a Saturday, muddy pitches on some grounds from early winter on, teams rather than 'squads' and when you could pronounce all the players' names. A wealthy owner signing a player over the head of the manager would also look absurd back then, but now seems commonplace, so in that regard the film is prescient.

Not a big fan of Ian McShane but he's excellent here, giving the only really convincing performance and blends in well with the footage from the Forest/Southampton League cup final. (To me he has a passing resemblance to the superb England goalkeeper of the era, Peter Shilton.) Neither Adam Faith nor Paul Nicholas were great actors to say the least, the latter also turning up in another Jackie Collins' epic The World Is Full Of Married Men, released shortly prior to this. So for fans of Ms Collins and Mr Nicholas, 1979 was their year.

A prime piece of late 1970s' fluff starring Ian McShane as a (sort of) George Best character and Paul Nicholas as a wealthy pop star who has bought into a football club (I'm guessing this part of the film was inspired by Elton John's involvement with Watford FC). Written by renown football expert Jackie Collins, and also starring Suzanne Somers as Cloudy, the type of female character name you could only get in a film written by Jackie Collins ...with Alan Lake in all his medallion man glory, who appears to have done more lines offscreen than he gets onscreen.

Whereas most movies with Jackie Collins' name attached to them were ubiquitous during the VHS era (especially 'The Stud' and 'The Bi*ch') this one mysteriously never made it to video in the UK, but has been dusted off a few times recently by Talking Pictures TV.

YESTERDAY'S HERO is an odd little film about a washed-up drunken footballer trying to get his life back on track. I watched it for two reasons: one is that I've been getting into these 'kitchen sink' type dramas recently and I was expecting more of the same, and two, I'm a massive fan of Ian McShane and I was looking forward to seeing him in a different role from the usual gangster tough guys and the like. I think it's fair to comment that McShane makes this movie. He completely convinces as the former star and gets the viewer on side despite not playing an entirely sympathetic hero. He's thoroughly believable and the consummate professional as always. Sadly, the rest of the film can't match his talent. The film was written by Jackie Collins and has a high level of cheese and schmaltz in it that I wasn't expecting.

Worst of all are the random disco dancing sequences which are shoe-horned into the plot at random intervals and which seem to go on and on endlessly. These feature American starlet Suzanne Somers and Adam Faith teaming up to perform a number of cheesy duets with some of the annoyingly catchy tunes playing repeatedly throughout. Now, I'm a fan of '70s music so I liked the tunes here, but they're completely out of place compared to the rest of the film which goes for a gritty atmosphere and they slow things down considerably. It's almost as if they were added in as an afterthought following the success of Saturday NIGHT FEVER and they do a disservice to McShane's central plot line.

This is one of those upbeat 70s movies about an alcoholic football player who's career is on the skids, but for some unfathomable reason he is given a second bite of the cherry.

This has to be one of the least known UK football movies and based on my viewing it's easy to see why. Simply put there is more disco than football. And I mean there's a lot of it. And it's not even good disco, it's very bad disco. It's the worst kind of disco imaginable. The reason there is so much bad music is that the owner of the team just happens to be a singer. So we have to endure disco when he sings.....but also during any of the football scenes. So it's a double disco endurance test.

The cast are basically a who's who of every bad male 1970s UK TV actor around. They look so out of place in a movie. Even McShane seems disinterested.

Fans of football movies look away, it may serve as a snapshot of the worst UK fashion and music scenes of the 70s, but that's basically it.

Maybe because it was written by a famous female author much of the so called action is centred around the protagonists love life, but even that aspect is pretty flat.

Maybe watch it to say you have seen it but you have been warned, it's a bit like being stuck at a wedding dance and the DJ only has obscure disco tracks he enjoys but nobody else does, and every now and then you have to listen to an old drunk tell you about how they could have been a great footballer. Head for the exit!