Football and scoundrels

Ah, George Clooney. You are one of those people in the movie business who can do and say anything you want. Usually you have used that power to throw your weight behind socially conscious films like Good Night, and Good Luck and Michael Clayton. Or you’ve used your clout to raise awareness about issues like the Darfur conflict.

Now, that’s great, it really is, but thankfully you’ve also decided to use that power to make Leatherheads, a movie that had me laughing out of the theater.

Clooney co-wrote, directed and stars in Leatherheads, so make no mistake: If you don’t buy into the guy’s roguish-yet-charming personality, then you’re not going to like this movie at all. For those who are into the guy, this is one of the most straight-up entertaining flicks to come along in a while.

Leatherheads is set in 1925, and follows the concurrent paths of Dodge Connolly (Clooney), an aging leader of pro-football team the Duluth Bulldogs, and Carter Rutherford (John Krasinski), star of the popular Princeton football team and a nationally recognized war hero.

Connolly manages to convince Rutherford to join his team in an attempt to revitalize the Bulldogs as well as the fledgling existence of pro football. At the same time, Lexi Littleton (played by a sharper-than-usual Renee Zellweger), star reporter of the Chicago Tribune, arrives on the scene to cover Rutherford, attempting to unravel the truth behind his lauded war story. An instant love triangle unsurprisingly ensues, in which Rutherford unsurprisingly loses, with a good amount of punching and bantering in between.

Leatherheads’ appeal rests largely in its firm dedication to being a screwball comedy, without letting it get too out of hand. Though it looks like a modern movie, the plot and dialogue feel refreshingly old-fashioned. “I didn’t come here to be insulted!” a spurned would-be wooer of Littleton blusters, to which she coolly replies, “Oh? Where do you usually go?”

This fast-paced back-and-forth sensibility pervades the whole movie. An opposing team calls Connolly an “old man” on the field, which is followed by an immediate cut to the inevitable team-on-team brawl (in which there is, of course, neither bloodshed nor injury). Connolly instructs a newly recruited linebacker to “hit anybody who comes near.” So he does, punching half the opposing team and the referee.

A memorable conversation between Connolly and Littleton from their respective train beds in a sleeper car would be more at home in a ’40s bedroom farce than a 2008 flick with an A-List cast. And all this is over a Randy Newman soundtrack of swung horns and tight vocal harmonies.

Leatherheads was originally written by sportswriters Rick Reilly and Duncan Brantley as a film about professional football’s infancy. It ended up being more about the time period and characters than a genuine sports movie. The game of football really functions more as a plot vehicle here than it does an actual plot. Which is crappy for those wanting to see an in-depth sports movie, but good for everybody else.

Leatherheads has a campiness that’s especially interesting. It’s over-the-top, but at the same time it isn’t. Even when the physical comedy reaches Looney Tunes-esque proportions, such as when Connolly slams a door in the face of charging police officers and manages to knock them out, the aura of the film never suffers.

Clooney’s smart enough not to overdo the period and genre stuff and just let the material flow, having characters jump on moving trains, go to speakeasies and smash bottles over heads without calling attention to its retro-ness.

This sensibility makes Leatherheads funny, entertaining and, dare I say it, enjoyably American. An interesting directorial follow-up to Good Night, and Good Luck, to say the least.

So thanks, George. There’s enough of your loveable scoundrel shtick in here to last us quite awhile. You can go back to being serious. Kisses.