Breakfast Sermon
Every time I hear this Al Pacino locker-room speech, I feel the current all over again. It’s one of the best passages Oliver Stone ever put to pen, and may well be the most inspirational levitation moment ever delivered in a film. Because the sports context ain’t the half of it.
“We’re in hell right now, gentlemen. Believe me. And we can stay here and get the shit kicked out of us. Or we can fight out way back, into the light. We can climb out of hell. One inch at a time. That’s what football is. That’s what life is. The margin of error is so small, it’s inches…and the inches we need are everywhere around us. On this team we fight for that inch. Because we know that when we add up all those inches, that’s going to make the fucking difference between winning and losing. Between living and dying. In any fight, it’s the guy who’s willing to die who’s going to win that inch.”
I don’t know if anyone has an opinion on this as it’s an ancient conundrum (sort of) but seeing this brought it up all over again:
When I was in the LA Film Critics Assn, I saw this film and thought it was a terrific contender for honors. I was assured by one the group’s most esteemed members that “it’s enjoyable and a good film but NOT an awards season movie.”
Technically, the member was right. This pic received bupkus.
But what does this say a) about the way critics view movies vis a vis honors and b) the ways that Awards Seasons happen, ie how some pretentious drivel gets drooled over and terrific films are roadkill?
Gaydos, to be fair, this movie came out in 1999, a year overflowing with very-good-or-better movies, so while I agree with the sentiment, there’s a litany of ’99 movies, pretentious and not, that seem kinda screwed over if we’re looking at awards attention.
The ’99 Best Picture nominees do feel like a bit of a bunt, though. They were American Beauty, The Sixth Sense, The Green Mile, The Insider, and THE CIDER HOUSE RULES.
American Beauty, The Insider, and The Sixth Sense are all worthy choices. Mostly not my top-five picks (American Beauty hasn’t aged super-well, although it’s still really good). But Green Mile and especially Cider House?! In the year of, in no particular order:
Magnolia; Three Kings; Toy Story 2; Bringing Out the Dead; Election; Go; Run Lola Run; The Matrix; Eyes Wide Shut; The Iron Giant; The Blair Witch Project; Mystery Men; Bowfinger; Dogma; Sleepy Hollow; Cradle Will Rock…hell, I’m a Star Wars apologist, so I’d take Phantom Menace over Cider House or Green Mile. I’d put Beauty, Insider, and Sixth Sense on that big list — and maybe Any Given Sunday, towards the bottom. But probably not Green Mile and no way could I waste a slot on my Top 30 list for Cider House Rules. Yet it made it into the top five for the Academy.
Obviously not everything I just listed was “Best Picture material” (in some cases not even close)… but loving them anyway, I guess that proves your original point. Sometimes great movies get shoved aside for not being “awardsy” enough. But we all know that.
That film was ridiculously stupid, made by people who don’t understand football – but yes, that one scene was great.
Just in my opinion, Oliver Stone tends to over-edit everything.
Compare this to the ‘baseball’ speech in The Untouchables, and you can see how perfectly-timed each edit is and how the camera hangs on every word DeNiro says, even when he’s walking or moving.
The difference in these two scenes is quite apparent.
I know this isn’t the point of your post, just something I noticed about it.
Great speech, great writing.
Too bad it took place in the context of that movie.
I’ve got “Any Given Sunday” in my top five for 1999. I find a number of other films from that year to be highly overrated. Al Pacino was totally ripped off in the Best Actor race with “AGS” and “The Insider.” I felt his character’s arc in “The Insider” was far more interesting than Crowe’s. Anyway, 1999 was the last great year for world cinema and there are any number of films that were ignored come Oscar time. “Topsy-Turvy” is still the best Mike Leigh film and it only got a costume design nomination, if I’m remembering correctly. You could go on and on for hours about 1999. “Titus” is still one of the best Shakespeare adaptations I’ve ever seen (stage or screen). It got some meager art direction nomination. Matt Damon has never been better than he was in “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” but he only got a Golden Globe nom. On and on and on.
As far as “Any Given Sunday” being made by people who didn’t understand football…WHO CARES!!!! “AGS” was about a ton of issues that America was facing at that time and still is. Generational conflict, big business bottom-line thinking versus the love of the game/individual, racial issues, women’s lib (i.e. women having more masculine qualities) versus societies desire for you to still be a woman, do you blow the whistle or just go along to get along (i.e. James Woods/Matthew Modine conflict). I could go on four maybe three or four hours talking about “AGS.” Unfortunately, a lot of “arts” people and film people consider it to be just a big, dumb sports flick and are unwilling to see all the issues that are brought up in the film. Jamie Foxx has never been better. His two main scenes with Pacino are fantastic.
Stone doesn’t “over-edit”…sorry, but you’re wrong on that one, big boy!
A classic moment in an okay film is the consensus here, and I guess I basically agree with that. It’s certainly Oliver Stone’s last really solid movie though. One of Pacino’s finest moments.
Still only the second-best speech Stone ever wrote, after Sgt. Barnes’ “If the machine breaks down, we break down”. I’d love to see someone post them intercut with each other.
I agree with Josh on the accuracy verdict, BUT… it’s such a fun movie, and for my money maybe the best thing Stone’s ever done, simply because it’s compulsively rewatchable on TV. Ham acting throughout, scenery-chewing galore… great fun.
And that speech is the last great thing Pacino’s done, that clip is as good as anything else from his career that could be shown in a retrospective.
1) I agree with the editing gripes. I love this speech and actually never appreciated it fully until a friend played it for me on his stereo before a football game. I have the mp3 of the speech on my Ipod and it comes up frequently on shuffle. I listened to the speech probably 40 times between viewing of AGS. I recently rewatched the film and I felt that the scene does lose some power due to the quick cuts. I would have focused on Pacino and used longer shots. Maybe a single shot where Pacino belts out the whole speech from the right angle would have generated some oscar nominations (Not that Stone wants my advice)
2) The speech is so good and truly underrated. I always had a sneaking suspicion the speech was written first then the movie was built around it.