January 15, 2009

The Express is based on the story of Ernie Davis, the first black man to win the Heisman Trophy in NCAA Football history. Following in Jim Brown's footsteps, Ernie Davis played for Syracuse University in the late 1950's. He had a stellar career at Syracuse and was signed by the NFL's Cleveland Browns. Sadly his life was cut short by leukemia before he ever played a down in the NFL.

In many ways, The Express is another version of Rudy, but the comparison really is unfair to both movies. In many ways, The Express is better. I'm sure some people will see it as a “black version of Rudy”, but that couldn't be further from the truth. The story of Ernie Davis is far bigger than being the 'best black football player'. He was even a better man.

Though the blatant prejudice environment of 60 years ago can be a little shocking for 2009 sensibilities, this movie gives us an opportunity to reflect on our own thoughts and prejudices when we look at someone different than us.

Much of The Express seems to be spent detailing the racial tension and lack of diversity in 1959 Syracuse with the focus point being Ernie Davis. Some of the extras certainly drive the point home with interviews of current Syracuse students and Alumni. The Express is an interesting and at times profound commentary on the late 1950's culture, but the movie is really more about a great football player and man.

The tragedy of it all was we never got to see Ernie Davis play against the best of the best. We only got to see all too short glimpses of the glory of his life. But it is good to hear the impact his story has had on so many others.

Filmmaking: 9
Directed by Gary Fleder, The Express has some of the best football footage I have ever seen. In most movies you can tell the actors are pulling their punches and it doesn't allow you to be drawn into the action. The Express is shot mostly in Ernie Davis' point of view. In effect, you are in his shoes. Not only is the on-field action shot well, the off-field interactions are also deeply meaningful.

The film is show with a generally drab color pallet. The faces and personalities of the characters far outshine any set or clothing design. However the cinematography, particularly the lighting, is almost like another character on the screen. There are some scenes where the lighting is almost poetic. It tells part of the story of what's going on inside Ernie Davis' head. Any film student will learn a lot from this movie.

Visuals: 8
There are not many sports movies that have a good HD transfer. Either there is tremendous digital noise reduction or it just looks soft from the age of the print or other issues. The Express has one of the best HD transfers I have seen on a sports movie with a 1080p transfer and a 2.35:1 widescreen presentation. There are clips, which are deliberately made grainy to give us the dramatic look of film, as it would have been shot in 1959. But the overall movie is clean and without blemish. Unfortunately due to the rather drab colors, The Express will not be on anyone’s “demo” list to show off their system.

It's interesting to note that the menu system is identical to Friday Night Lights (another football film from Universal). Obviously someone at Universal has a template. With the advanced features of Blu-Ray I would think a little bit of creativity is in order but apparently not on The Express.

Sound: 7
The Express features a DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix. Music is dynamic and fills the surround speakers enhancing the on screen drama. The music soundtrack fills the room from a football stadium to a rainy street. At times the dialog can be a little difficult to hear due to the active surround speakers, however that is easily solved by turning up the center channel. Spoken language tracks for The Express are available in English and Spanish 5.1 DTS HD. Subtitles are available in English, Spanish, and French.

Value: 9
The Express has one of the best set of extras of any sports movie I have seen. Unfortunately it is a mix of HD and SD footage. Some of the footage from 1959 is understandably SD, but the deleted scenes are inexcusably in SD. Extras include:

Deleted Scenes with optional Commentary by director Gary Fleder (8 min. SD) includes 3 deleted scenes. The scenes are not accessible individually from a menu however they are chapter encoded so you can skip to the one you want to see. The scenes are mostly character development, and while they are good scenes, they didn't really add anything additional to the film.

50th Anniversary of the 1959 Syracuse National Championship (17 min, SD) interviews former players on the 1959 Syracuse team about their historic rise to the 1959 National Championship. This is a fascinating documentary with footage from many of the regular season games and the championship. Syracuse was known by some as having the #1 and #2 teams in the country because their second string players were just as good as the first string.

Making of The Express (14 min HD) interviews the director, his crew and the actors about the filming process. It is a bit more than the standard studio piece and they even go into some of the reasons for the washed out colors.

Making History: The Story of Ernie Davis (14 min HD) an excellent piece with interviews from players, family, students and alumni. This type of extra should be required for any “based on a true story” movie, especially sports movies.

Inside the Playbook: Shooting the Football Games (7 min HD) goes into detail about some of the plays used in the film. It even has a telestrator to show some of the plays.

From Hollywood to Syracuse: The Legacy of Ernie Davis (5 min HD) interviews current Syracuse students and alumni and various other notable people about the lasting legacy of Ernie Davis. This could easily be a diversity and recruitment film about Syracuse.

Feature Commentary with Director Gary Fleder – is better than most commentaries. He spends a lot of time talking about the process and the lengths they went to so they wouldn't have the usual sports movie clichés.

Overall: 8.8
I am a lily-white Irish American so I am not going to pretend like I have any idea what it's like to be an African American in the United States, in the 50's or 2009. But as a movie fan, The Express is a very good movie and one worth watching, especially for the 90% of Americans who have never heard of Ernie Davis. But the extras on this disc are what make The Express really shine. What the movie didn't deliver, the extras certainly did.