FOREVER STRONG
Directed by Ryan Little
Produced by Adam Abel
Written by David Pliler
Released by Crane Movie Company
USA. 112 min. Rated PG-13
With Gary Cole, Sean Faris, Arielle Kebbel, Sean Astin, Neal McDonough, Penn Badgley, Julie Warner, Nathan West, Michael Pagan & Max Kasch
 

The inspirational sports genre adds a capable film to its ranks with this story of a freewheeling rugby player who must train with his archrivals to shorten his stay at a juvenile delinquency center. 

Rick Penning (Sean Faris, who with this performance officially inherits the “Tom Cruise Doppelganger” trophy from Scott Wolf) lives life like he plays rugby: with a lot of intensity and a disregard for rules. Coached by his domineering father, Rick and the Razorbacks lose the championship game to Highland, a mysterious group of Maori-chanting young men that never seem to lose, cheat, or offend anyone. After an evening of drinking, Rick and his girlfriend keep the party going when they speed away in his convertible. Their joyride ends with his car crashed, his girlfriend tangled in barbed wire, and his driving record hit with a second DUI. Goodbye Arizona, hello Utah Juvenile Detention Center.

After spending his initial months in juvie raising hell and popping pills, Rick starts to come around with the help of a counselor (Sean Astin, calling to mind his performance in Rudy) who used to play for Highland. Soon, Rick agrees to practice with Highland, and he slowly sheds his oversize ego, reluctantly forsaking his on-the-field selfishness and off-the-field partying.

Implicitly advocating a Mormon message (the director and producer are prominent figures in the LDS film community) and occasionally frustrating in its black-and-white portrayals of its characters' moral dilemmas, Forever Strong will not be an easy pill to swallow for cynics or postmodern ironists. This is not a morally relativistic environment but one where everyone who drinks gets into a car and wreaks havoc and everyone who wins confesses their past sins to Highland coach Larry Gelwix (Gary Cole, based on the real-life coach whose philosophy inspired the film) before a big game. There may be opportunities for redemption for some of the bad guys here, but don’t expect Gelwix to ever come across as anything but the Best Coach in the Universe.

Briskly paced and acted inoffensively—it’s a competent production, and Forever Strong deserves credit for tackling ethical issues in a way that’s not going to make it especially marketable to the young male demographic it needs to make money in a wide release. Patrick Wood
September 26, 2008