True Blue (1996)

Why so much hype?

Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Simply Perfect

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

I had read the book many years ago, and saw the movie for the first time last night. This is the story of the 1987 Boat Race (NOT 1986), and many who were close to those events have claimed the book inhabits something of a world of fiction. Regardless of whether or not that is true, the movie most certainly does, suffering acutely from two problems. The first is trying to dramatise a real-life story but not be sued out of existence by those portrayed as less than perfect in character, especially if they are Americans, and the second is needing actors to acquire specialist skills in a very short space of time. So the rowing scenes looked pretty awful, except for the long-range shots with real rowers, and they didn't even attempt to make sure they sourced equipment of the correct era. But to the non-rower, apart from Topolski and McDonald, everyone else seemed to be a cardboard cut-out of someone else. And then there were the accents. I have never met McDonald, but thought he was a Scot, not an upper-class Englishman. I have met Topolski, whose famous artist father Feliks was Polish, but left there ten years before Dan's birth. I think Dan was born in Britain, and certainly sounds as British as can be, so why cast a Belgian to play him with a Polish accent? I am a rower, and also a Cambridge man. Ultimately, since they were going to play so extremely fast and loose with the events of 1987, why couldn't they also depict a happy ending, with Oxford as gallant losers, but Cambridge well out in front????

I just caught this on DVD (2005) , and wish I'd seen it on release. I know little of the inner workings of the Blue Universities , or rowing , but of course being an Englishman always watch the boat race , and have since childhood. It was quite revealing how involved Americans are at Oxford , and the on board filming , and location shots were excellent. The first scenes showed a threat to takeover by the yanks , but slowly throughout the film the real metal of men was tested until the best comment in the movie summed it all up "It isn't great oarsman that win the boat race but great men" or words to that effect , which left the yank speechless. The whole film slowly revealed what type of man makes a good eights rower , and what is lacking in American character . A brilliant education in what it means to be British , and why we will always be superior to Americans. The one thing missing was some basic background in rowing rules , like the seat tests ? and stations ? etc.

"Aawks-furrd". According to the introductory voice-over, this is where True Blue is set. It seems this was a token attempt not to completely alienate an American audience. For this is a story where poor misguided Oxford rowers draft in wicked Americans to help beat the apparently unstoppable Force Of Nature that is Cambridge University, which has been so unsporting as to actually win the last Boat Race. We are thus drawn into a picturesque but insane world where the motto is "six months' torture for a lifetime's pride". Unfortunately, we have to take part in some of the torture as rowers and coaches bitch at each other about training too much. If the film could impart some of the ambition and dedication of top athletes to an ideal of winning (as does the book True Blue), then it would be exciting and disturbing. Similarly, if it could give an impression of their personal sacrifices it would remind us of how remarkable the Boat Race actually is in the sport of rowing. Unfortunately, the film falls between the two stools. It fails to show the personal lives of the squad beyond caricatures where bitterness and childish pranks are the norm, and therefore fails to create any sympathy with the characters; yet it also fails to do justice to the sport, showing us actors desperately trying to row as they bat up and down the boat, failing to make any impression on the boat speed except throwing up a lot of water at the camera. Rowing should be a sport that is smooth and beautiful, not rushed and convulsive.It is only when the film stops using actors and hires real rowers, drops the clunky script (who could forget such lines as "That's unconscionable!"?) and shows us an actual race that the director's skill can come through. He has been spending the rest of the film showing us beautiful but pointless shots of the sun rising over the dreaming spires of Oxford. In this way, the portrayal of the Boat Race itself almost makes up for the excruciating moroseness of the Blue Boat squad that has been flung at us for the last hour.In the end, if you want to see some nice shots of Oxford, see some well-built rowers in Lycra and hear a pseudo-"Chariots of Fire" soundtrack, you could watch this film. Or you could do a ten-thousand metre work session on a rowing machine, which would be shorter and less painful.

Based on the true story of an American at Oxford swearing to overcome defeat in the 1986 Boat Race (Oxford's first defeat to Cambridge in 11 years) by returning the following year with some international colleagues and the resultant "mutiny" when they refuse to follow the coach's training schedules.The film is a fictionalised account and comes down firmly (as did the book on which it is based) on the side of chief coach Dan Topolski and OUBC President Donald MacDonald. It's not a half bad attempt at telling a story with a good bash at both trying to underline the importance in the old universities of the boat race and the physical demands the race makes.The rowing is reasonably portrayed too, using real oarsmen as their opposition and with the actors having been taught to row by Topolski, but sometimes the continuity is lost and there are mistakes aplenty if you really try to go looking for them!It's not a film that challenges, but it does entertain - although how much it entertains a dry-bob is the big question!