Little Giants (1994)

Simply A Masterpiece

There are better movies of two hours length. I loved the actress'performance.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

I was a kid when this family sports comedy was released, eight years old to be specific, so it's a film I could have seen as a kid, only I never even heard anything about it back in the 1990's. I never knew it existed until sometime within the past couple years, and even then, I still wouldn't have discovered it if it hadn't been for now retired Rick Moranis playing the starring role here. I certainly wasn't expecting "Little Giants" to be too hilarious or original, judging by what I had learned about it, but since I knew it was more popular than probably a number of other films like this, there was a chance that I could at least find some good moments in it. However, that didn't happen, and the movie turned out to be even weaker than I could have imagined! Danny O'Shea is the younger brother of Kevin O'Shea, and both of them live in Urbania, Ohio. The arrogant older brother is a former Heisman Trophy winner, and currently the coach of the Urbania Cowboys, the town's little league football team. Becky is Danny's daughter, and is the only girl trying out for the team. She is their best player, but during the try-outs, her sexist uncle still rejects her. Obviously not happy about this, she forms a new children's football team with the other rejected Cowboys. This new team is called the Little Giants, and Becky convinces her father to coach them. However, the rule is "one town, one team," so it is decided that the two teams will go head to head in a playoff game, and the winners will be Urbania's little league football team, so Danny gathers more children for his team and begins to prepare his players for the competition. The younger O'Shea has always been living in the shadow of his brother, and this might be his chance to put an end to that, but the Giants' chances of winning the game are threatened by several problems! Needless to say, this movie certainly does have a predictable plot, and one that sure bored me! If anything here grabbed me at all it was very brief. It didn't help that none of the characters really meant anything to me, so I couldn't really root for anybody. Like most other movies I've reviewed recently, this one is also a bad comedy. I wouldn't have been surprised if I had found SOME laughs in the movie, even if they were sporadic, but I didn't even find one! Not only that, the only time I can remember even smiling was during the part where Danny calls the police on Kevin and Butz while they're spying on his team! Whenever any of the kids in the film are supposed to be funny, they always fail, and more notable than the rest in this regard is probably Rudy Zolteck. The gags involving this character's eating habits and his flatulence are always lame, and none of the other kids help, either (it's never fun watching their conflict, which is one of the problems), especially not Jake Berman, with his snot blowing.I watched this movie just days after watching "Ed", another cheesy family sports film, but one which is generally considered to be much worse than this. After watching "Little Giants", I wouldn't say it's quite as bad as the 1996 flop starring Matt LeBlanc, but as much as a lot of people might be disgusted by me saying this, I honestly fail to see how this 1994 little league football movie is THAT much better! Well, regardless of what others may think of these movies, I'd better not watch any more films like this anytime soon, as this has gone far enough! I know there are many films like this out there which I've never seen, but most of them are probably not worth watching. Rick Moranis has often made me laugh, with his "SCTV" appearances and in "The Adventures of Bob & Doug McKenzie: Strange Brew" (featuring two very famous characters from "SCTV" played by Moranis and Dave Thomas respectively), but even he isn't funny in this movie, and it has to be the worst one I've ever seen him in. If you're an adult, then unless you just love these kids' sports flicks, this is not a must-see.

I understand how much competition holds back the development of youths, I'm a teacher. But good intentions do not encourage learning and hope does not create understanding. Participation, motivation and being truthful with children does(and lots and lots of planning). The kids that watch this take the lesson that you can fall behind, not read, not participate and a miracle will happen. You will be able to pull reason, information and remember content from when you were drawing in class, on the day of the test from your heart, your courage and a magic hidden talent you possess deep inside you. What fools all the teachers who stay up until 1am(and up at 5am) planning for cooperative groups that encompasses multiple learning abilities in children to draw their interest in American literature and encourage them to work hard, have fun and be confident young people. You want a good sports movie moms - watch Little Big League, that's cute, and honest about the importance of fundamentals.

First off, let me make one thing perfectly straight: the one reason I saw this movie was to experience the rarity of Ed O'Neill in a leading role. I've watched Married With Children every chance I got the last 3-4 years, and ever since the first episode I saw, I wanted to see O'Neill in other roles, preferably in films. That's why I saw The Bone Collector, it's why I saw K9 and it's why I, against better judgment, saw this movie. OK, now that I've got that out of the way, let me make a point out of the fact that I really, really don't care for children's films. Yes, yes, I know, this is a "family film"... but that's really semantics, now isn't it? The reason the movie was made so kiddie-like wasn't to make it possible to show it to 'families', it was to make it acceptable viewing material for children. Face it, this is the kind of film that the parents rent for the kids if they want to have a night out or they just want to make absolutely sure that they won't be bothered by them for the next two hours or so. This really isn't that attractive a film choice for anyone over the age of 10. Apart from that, honestly, it's not all bad. Sure, it's a typical, predictable underdog tale glorifying one of the worlds most violent, ridiculous sports, but it's not entirely bad, and at least it's not another dreaded "kids taking care of the adults' problems" children's film. The plot is not the least bit original, but it's not bad. There seemed to be too many undeveloped subplots, though. The pacing is pretty good, despite my inherent hatred of kiddie flicks, I was rarely bored. The acting is mostly bad, but that's probably because it's a minor kids flick where most of the characters are children. O'Neill and Moranis are good, as are most of the other adults in the film. The humor is mostly juvenile and childish, but this is a children's film, so it's not like that's a big surprise. And at least not all of it is bad. Something I was surprised at was how credible and non-clichéd the characters were, despite many of them being stereotypical and more than half of them not even being properly fleshed out. I didn't hate O'Neill's character, even though he was Moranis's nemesis. Really, the film was far less mean-spirited than the usual children's film. It didn't rely too much on gross-out comedy, either. Honestly, for what type of film this is, you could do much worse. I don't know... if you need a children's film, keep this one in mind as a possibility. I recommend this mainly to kids and parents of sports fanatics. Fans of Ed O'Neill and/or Rick Moranis might want to check it out as well. 5/10

I still have yet to se a good family film about sports. It's always the same: bad team, gets good player, practices, and narrowly wins in the last three seconds of the game. How predictable can you get, Hollywood? I'm getting tired of this trash. Oh, and let's not forget the one or two mandatory swear words they always throw in to ensure PG and not G. However, Rick Moranis' "nerd" talent was good in this film, and kids might get a kick out of it. I wouldn't get mad if this film was labeled "kids", but it's not. It's labeled "Family", so make it family, writers! John