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 Synopsis:
 Set in depression-era
Savannah, Georgia, Bagger Vance is the story of
Rannulph Junuh. Junuh (Matt Damon) was a
local golfer who was on his way to being the
best in the country, before the war. Like
his fellow Georgians, Junuh joined up with the
military. After a traumatic incident at
war, Junuh returned to Savannah a broken man. Disregarding his fiancé Adele (Charlize Theron),
Junuh retreated to a life of drinking to attempt
to forget the harshness of war. Adele,
having been forced to take over her father's
golf course, is left with only one option to try
to save it and not sell to the highest
bidder...setup a golf tournament. She
convinces the two greatest golfers of the era,
Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen to have a match at
her father's course. Owners of the course
demand another superstar, a local boy, and
therefore Adele's recruitment of Junuh begins.
Junuh really has no interest, but through the
inspiration of a 10 year old boy and the sudden
appearance of a golf guru in Bagger Vance, he
comes around. Will the local boy pull
through against the big boys?
The Freak's Rating: C : This
is the first, of what I hope to be many,
recommendations from my mother in law
Joyce.
For those who don't know, Jen & I work our 9-5
jobs in an office attached to her parents' home.
Joyce is a movie lover, watching quite a few of
them. She works odd hours, so sometimes
her "evenings" or "mornings" are our afternoons.
When this happens and Joyce feels like it, she
pops a movie in. Sharing a wall with their
family room downstairs, Jen & I are treated to
the subwoofer thumping of whatever film she
decides to watch. It always brings a
chuckle whenever we hear it and I'm hoping
she'll now start to review every one that she
sees on my site!
The Legend of Bagger Vance
has the most interesting teaser credit at the
beginning of it I've seen in a while, "A Robert
Redford film". Redford is one of my
favorite actor/directors and I'm therefore
instantly intrigued to watch it. I
couldn't help but flash to some of my earliest
movie memories watching the great sports movie
The Natural. Redford would certainly bring
that magic to yet another film.
Bagger Vance is noted as a
"legend", but this "legend" is never told.
We don't see where he comes from, where he goes
or hear much about him. What we do see is
Bagger quoting Zen-like statements to assimilate
golf to life. It isn't that we don't
believe he is sincere, but we really don't know
much about him. Charlize Theron should
have been drug out and shot after her
performance as Adele. She has perhaps the
worst southern accent I have ever heard.
The script of this movie tries to force feelings
on you that don't come naturally. I
honestly didn't care enough about any of the
characters for it to matter to me what happened.
Damon is the only character that has any real
arc and development and his turn as Junuh does
come off nicely. J. Michael Moncrief plays
the 10 year old Hardy Greaves. This is the
most annoying child actor I've seen in quite
some time. He has done zero work since
this movie and it is easy to see why. He
overacts every scene he is in.
Bright spots of the film
include nice performances by Bruce McGill as
Hagen and Joel Gretsch as Jones. Also,
Damon and Smith do all right with what they had
to work with. The advice from Bagger does
get a little fortune cookie-ish though. I
liked Chevy Chase's advice in Caddyshack a
little better. As I said, I really wanted
to love this movie, but with the cast and crew
involved I do feel disappointed. With the
names in the credits of this film, it should be
a solid A...and it falls short.
Joyce's Rating: B :
A light hearted movie. Little violence and sex. I thought Robert
Redford did a good job in capturing the mood of Rannulph Junuh..... the long
pensive looks. On the negative side, it was a liitle sappy. But sometimes we
need sap!
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