The Game Plan
10/14/2007 Posted by ephraimh
The plot: Self-obsessed quarterback of the Boston Rebels learns he has an eight year-old daughter and has to adjust to fatherhood. Simple story that we've heard before. The QB's obsession with his greatness is funny and not stuffed down our throats the way these things sometimes are. His quirks open the movie and the daughter, Payton(I kid you not), shows up with birth certificate in hand. He goes from "this can't be happening to me" to "she's the best thing to ever happen to me." Natch. The ending is, of course, a little sappy and, oh, so predictable. This type of movie can't avoid that unless it's willing to break ground, but this one isn't. All is resolved in the usual way by show time's end. The redeeming parts are that, while on the whole, the family values angle is constantly there, the film's parts aren't in your face. The QB's "it can't be happening to me" is not over done. The kid has some good lines; the QB's agent is not as schmaltzy as most are in this kind of film - which is a plus. The best parts are the kid's performance, some very good double-takes and a couple of football players who are quirky enough for some good-natured laughs. The worst part is that we've seen this story before and the director and whoever else didn't have a game plan to make it stand out. The football scenes seemed a little strained to me. It's harmless fun for a Saturday afternoon, the younger kids will like it and it might be a good first-date movie. I picked this flick because I was 10 minutes late for the movie I wanted to see. I would have had to wait an hour or so for the next showing of another film.
Pros: Harmless fun
Cons: tired plot, not much to set it apart from its predecessors
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