Movies
The Bear' is superficial and shallow
By SHAWN BEHLEN
Staff Reviewer
Last week. Director Richard
Sarafian told At Ease that he
wanted to show more about
Paul "Bear" Bryant in "The
Bear" than just his football ex
ploits. He wanted to show us
the 'man behind the legend,' to
use an old cliche.
I hate to be the voice of
doom, folks, but he just doesn't
do it.
"The Bear" is a superficial
look at a very long and illus
trious career. It dutifully hits
every highlight and every re
cord-breaking event. But that is
all it does. And that we already
knew.
The film follows Bryant from
age 17 when he fought a bear to
earn his nickname, to the 1983
Liberty Bowl where he won his
323rd victory. In between there,
he attends the University of Al
abama and is a member of the
undefeated team that wins the
1934 Rose Bowl, becomes an as
sistant coach at Alabama,
moves on to the University of
Maryland for one year, coaches
at the University of Kentucky
and turns a losing program into
a winning one with the school's
first bowl bid, comes to Texas
A&M and starts a radical train
ing program that is designed to
motivate a championship team,
and finally ends up as the na
tion's winningest coach back at
Alabama.
That's a pretty long list there,
but it doesn't tell you anything
about the man that did all that,
does it? Well, neither does the
Halftime Speech
Gary Busey, as Paul 'Bear' Bryant, gives a locker room pep talk to the
Texas A&M football team during a scene from 'The Bear.
film, which is a similar list on
celluloid. It follows event after
event, game after game, move
after move, and never lets us
see more. We are never shown
why Bryant acts and reacts like
he does. And that is what this
film is supposedly trying to do.
The saving grace of this film
is Gary Busey. He gives a
strong performance as Bryant.
It is even better than his earlier
portrayal of Buddy Holly, for
which he received an Academy
Award nomination. The hard
est part of his job had to be
making the time changes and
ages believable. Busey pulls it
off. I only wish there had been
more of a story for him to work
with.
The other performances can't
really be evaluated because no
body but Busey is on the screen
long enough to really do any
thing. So many events are
squeezed into such a short time
that people come and go after
about three lines of dialogue —
never to be seen again.
The scenes at Texas A&M
take up a fair portion of the
film. The main problem is that it
is painfully obvious that these
scenes were filmed in 1983 and
not when Bryant was around. I
even caught sight of some guys
holding up signs telling the
crowds what to do during the
football game scene. The bon
fire shot is short, but the yell
practice at The Grove is fairly
long.
The scenes at the Junction
training camp, where Bryant
took freshmen recruits the first
year he was here, will surely
cause some comments. The
whole situation is used mostly
for humor in the film (aren't
Aggies always worth a good
laugh?), when there is nothing
funny about anything Bryant is
doing.
Before seeing this film, I had
learned quite a bit about Bryant
and was anxious to learn the
answers to several questions.
What gave Bryant such control
over his players that they
would do anything he asked?
How could he get away with
brutal tactics that most people
wouldn't put up with? In other
words, what made him so spe
cial?
Now that I've seen "The
Bear" I still have those same
questions and no answers.
Hollywood marriage fails in moving drama
By SHAWN BEHLEN
Staff Reviewer
"Irreconcilable Differen
ces" is being billed as a com
edy. Well, don't you believe
it. There are some funny mo
ments and some funny lines,
but overall, we're talking se
rious drama here.
The film stars Ryan
O'Neal, Shelley Long
("Cheers") and Drew Barry
more ("E.T."). As it starts,
Barrymore is taking her par
ents, O'Neal and Long, to
court — she wants a divorce.
"You treat me like chattel,"
she says.
Through extended flash
backs during the court pro
ceedings, we then get to see
her parents' relationship
from beginning to end.
They meet on a highway.
Long is driving her fiance's
car to California and O'Neal
is hitchhiking to UCLA
where he has been hired as a
professor of film. The car is
stolen, but they fall in love
anyway. They talk about his
graduate thesis and her de
sire to write children's books
and love is oh, so sweet.
Long then breaks the news to
her old flame (one of the best
scenes in the movie) and mar
ries O'Neal two days later.
Life in California is pleas
ant, but not very exciting for
the newly married couple. He
loves his job, she cleans the
house and they have a beauti
ful daughter. Then, O'Neal is
asked to write a screenplay
and, if it meets approval, di
rect it. He and Long end up
writing it together, he gets to
direct and the film is a huge
success.
O'Neal becomes Mr. Holly
wood and for his next film
picks a local car-hop to play
the lead. She moves in ("So
we can work with her night
and day," he tells Long) and
takes over. Eventually, Long
moves out.
His next film, a musical
version of "Gone With the
Wind," stars his protegee
once again. Needless to say,
with a premise like that it is
the biggest bomb in history.
Long, who has been doing
nothing but sulking and eat
ing and eating and eating,
starts writing again as a form
of revenge.
"He Said It Would Last For
ever" becomes the number
one book in the land and the
tables are reversed. She even
buys O'Neal's house which
he must sell because of bank
ruptcy. The bitterness and
feuds are nof pretty.
Throughout all of this,
someone is being ignored —
their child. Careers and re
venge have taken over. The
daughter is the last thing on
her parents' minds. Several
scenes are shot in an excellent
manner that drives this point
home. O'Neal and Long will
be screaming at each other
and Barrymore will be way
down in the corner of the
screen watching with wide
eyes and a slack expression.
She sees a lot more than any
little girl should. Her parents
play her off against each
other and, as she explains in
court, treat her like a dog.
"You pet a dog when you
need attention and then for
get about it for days," she
says. "People shouldn't be
treated like dogs." Pretty cyn
ical for an eight year old,
right? Well, her parents de
serve it.
As you can tell from that
description, this film ad
dresses more than just the
rights of children. Even
tually, it settles down on the
age-old topic of Hollywood
corruption. Money, fame and
reputation are what rip this
family apart. Once they lose
simple values, happiness and
caring are gone.
The film does a good job of
showing the family's destruc
tion. The writers have ob
viously been around the situ
ation enough to pin it to the
wall for observation. Not all
scenes are successful, but the
ones that work are strong and
in the large majority.
The performances by
O'Neal and Long also are
good. After so many horrible
performances in so many ter
rible movies, O'Neal has fi
nally redeemed himself in
this one. Even though his
character obviously is making
the wrong choices through
out this film, O'Neal makes it
easy to understand why he
would do so.
Long proves that she can
work on the big screen as
well as she does on tele
vision. Here is a characteriza
tion with depth. She is origi
nally the one that is jilted, but
she comes back to exact pay
ment with a vengeance. Long
makes both attitudes believ
able.
Together, they make this
film work. It examines an un
pleasant side of fame and for
tune and does it well.