Review of Harvard Beats Yale 29-29 (2008) by Thomas L — 16 Mar 2009

Hands down one of the most entertaining documentaries I've ever seen, and proof yet again that the most amazing stories are the ones that actually happened. In the spirit of Seabiscuit and the 1980 Olympic hockey game between the US and USSR comes this story of a football game between Harvard and Yale in November 1968.

They play each other every year, but neither team had shown up undefeated since 1909. Yale should've killed them. Neither team won, but Harvard's tie was sort of a victory. And it's the way they tied them that's impossible to fathom.

Had this been a Hollywood movie, it would've been panned as too far fetched. The documentary's title comes from the headline the day after the game in the Harvard campus newspaper. The structure of the documentary was neat too.

What Kevin Rafferty did was, he worked through the game chronilogically, showing several plays at a stretch with nothing but the live commentary from the game itself, and interspersed it with interviews from players on both teams.

Including Tommy Lee Jones of all people, who went to Harvard and played guard on the team. And then you've got Merritt "Mick" Kleber, D lineman for Yale and my former boss at a dotcom startup in Century City ten years ago.

Had I known then that he'd been part of such a ridiculously entertaining football game, I'd've picked his brain for sure. Not even the most creative writer in the world could invent this kind of entertainment.