Reviewed by e Howard Green. Seen at the Arlington Theatre, Santa Barbara, February 7, 2015.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
How can the\u00a0“feel good” Walt Disney Pictures\u00a0movie McFarland, USA,<\/em><\/strong> about youthful runners overcoming disadvantages,\u00a0dilute the\u00a0warm glow from\u00a0an audience? \u00a0By repeated\u00a0product placement of a beverage product! \u00a0One that was so blatantly featured\u00a0that it diverted the viewers attention\u00a0from\u00a0the beauty of the settings, the courage of the runners, and the chutzpah of the coach. \u00a0Even if a variety of different branded products were included, such\u00a0presence would add nothing to the story. \u00a0The crass commercial inclusion of this one product was upsetting to this viewer, and I can believe to many in the audience.<\/p>\n The story line begins with the move of a high school sports coach Jim White (Kevin Costner) to a “last grasp” type of teaching job in a rural, mostly Hispanic\u00a0community in California’s San Joaquin\u00a0Valley, where his family\u00a0may be the only “Anglo”\u00a0residents in this Latino\u00a0town. \u00a0 Eventually White discovers a hidden skill\u00a0among the students, the ability to run fast, and helps them to found a Cross Country Team. \u00a0It is no spoiler to reveal that after losses in initial meets, they train hard and become competitive runners.<\/p>\n Credit must be given to the seven young men who played the roles of the runners; they were awesome in their acting. \u00a0Also impressive was the closing roll where the\u00a0real life 1987 team was\u00a0shown, still running regularly, a quarter-century later, with their life stories and present occupations shown. \u00a0The festivals closing night audience burst out in applause as each man’s mini-bio was presented.<\/p>\n The Ventura Star newspaper reported that some scenes were filmed in nearby Camarillo. Also recognized were vistas and\u00a0trails in the hills above Stanford University. \u00a0The beauty of the locations and photography contributed to the overall story line, despite the inclusion of the poor community of McFarland itself.<\/p>\n This is a sports drama genre film, with special appeal to Californians and Latinos.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Reviewed by e Howard Green. Seen at the Arlington Theatre, Santa Barbara, February 7, 2015. How can the\u00a0“feel good” Walt Disney Pictures\u00a0movie McFarland, USA, about youthful runners overcoming disadvantages,\u00a0dilute the\u00a0warm glow from\u00a0an audience? \u00a0By repeated\u00a0product placement of a beverage product! \u00a0One that was so blatantly featured\u00a0that it diverted the viewers attention\u00a0from\u00a0the beauty of the settings, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36898,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,255],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films","category-santa-barbara-film-festival-2015"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/36898"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33040"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33040\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}