Review of The Great Debaters (2007) by Tara A — 27 Feb 2009

This is a by the numbers cliched based on a true story movie about underdogs. I watched this because I thought they might actually bring some insight into debate teams. They don't. Instead we get subplots seen a gazillion times before. Denzel Washington is the inspirational teacher but he is too two dimentional. We have no idea who Melvin Tolson is just that he was well educated. His work as a writer is a footnote. Too much emphasis is put on his work as a union organizer, it seems more appropriate in another film. As for Forest Whitaker, he is the strict and stern father who doesn't acknowledge his son's accomplishments until the third act. When Denzel Whitaker comes rushing home because he's a precocious 14 year old child who got a spot on a college debate team, his father just blows it off. (FYI: Guess who gets the big debate at the end which wins it all for the team?) There's two players battling over one girl plot. The cliched only girl on the team subplot. There's the battle between Forrest Whitaker and Washington's characters until Whitaker comes around when Tolson is arrested for organizing unions. Denzel Washington directed this movie and Oprah Winfrey produced it. I don't know, but I was expecting a little more. It shows segregation and racism, but it portrays all white people as idiots. John Heard is the chubby sweating sheriff who says "Okie-dokie." I guess he must have thought it was a comedy. There is a scene in which the team comes up on a lynching, but the scene is passed over and never mentioned again. Filmmakers admitted they took a few liberties. This college didn't debate Harvard to be national champs, it was the University of Southern California. I think some other liberties were taken. I wonder if Tolson was really arrested. There is no further mention of his arrest. It would have been interested if the team had to debate topics they didn't agree with, but we don't see that. In fact, the debates are short and presented in the montage mode.

I like Denzel Washington as an actor, but as a director...