ALARIS' REVIEWS

26th November 2009
The Great Debaters (2007)

I have to admit, I'm not a great Denzel Washington fan. He seems like a decent guy, who always does a competent job in well regarded films (Cry Freedom, 1987; The Pelican Brief, 1993), but I've never really warmed to his stuff.

However, The Great Debaters sounded right up my alley - set in Texas during the 1930s, the movie follows a small-town debate team as they become the first African American students to debate the prestigious Harvard team.

I love underdogs. I love rousing speeches. I love important symbolic victories, which have the power to inspire people a million miles away, two thousand years later ("I am Spartacus. No, I am Spartacus!" Sure, maybe it never happened, but it's still really cool.)

Unfortunately, The Great Debaters didn't quite live up to my expectations. The debates comprise a much smaller portion of the film than I would have liked, and the story shifts from personal dramas to politics to damning social portrait, without a strong enough unifying arc. At over two hours long, the film feels as though it wanders a little, especially in the middle section.

The film is constrained by the fact that it's based on a true story, but the sense of personal stakes - which should be intense - feels diffuse across the characters, and is further diluted by a lukewarm love triangle.

Nonetheless, the actors all deliver competent performances, and the speeches are often stirring and articulate, if few and far between. Denzel Whitaker is endearing as the sweet and idealistic James Farmer Jnr., the debate team's fourteen year old researcher. Jurnee Smollett transforms from mild mannered and ambitious to confident and fiery over the course of the film, as Samantha Brooke, the team's only female debater, and an aspiring lawyer. Denzel Washington is.well, Denzel.

The Great Debaters has a great, dramatic premise, but it doesn't quite carve out its place. The teacher-student dynamic isn't as electric as in the memorable 80s classic, Dead Poet's Society (1989). The triumph against injustice isn't as cathartic as in the sometimes harrowing The Shawshank Redemption (1994) .

The Great Debaters is inspiring in parts, appropriately disturbing in others, but it didn't leave me with the kind of impact I felt it should have.

Verdict: An inspiring drama with good intentions, but unfocused delivery.