By Leilani Neal
Feature Film Columnist
Kevin Costner redeems himself after the clique movie Black or White. He proves himself and shows his true ability as an actor with the role of Coach Jim White in this heartwarming film, which is based on a Cross Country team from McFarland, California in 1987. McFarland USA succeeds in making its audience laugh from cultural differences and cry from the sad reality of being a minority (and how you are looked down upon and judged based on your background).
McFarland USA starts with Coach White, a football coach who was fired to throwing a shoe at one of his football players who was disrespecting him. After the incident, white was fired and was able to find a new job available at McFarland High School, a school that sits right next door to a prison. All of the students on the first Cross Country team in McFarland High School worked everyday from 4am in fields, picking crops to bring money to their families to live and have food on the table. They were called, “Pickers”. Every member of the McFarland community portrayed in the film were Mexican-Americans or immigrants who came to America for a better life. And in the process of wanting a better life the 7 young Mexican-American men joined their schools cross-country team and made history.
McFarland USA was directed by Niki Caro, who had done an amazing job with shoots to show even more beauty of the film. Her technique in keeping the movie in a perfect realm of time (2hrs 8min), she was also able to satisfy the audience from start to finish and do not make anyone leave the audience confused but only wishing that she could watch it again. Though the movie was amazing, there was a moment in the film where it left the audience slightly lost and that was the sequence of the races that McFarland did. Though, it is understandable why it was done that way, for a moment audiences were confused on how only doing four races in a season could qualify you for a State Championship. But realizing now, the Director had chosen the most significant races for the team throughout their season, the first one is their very first meet as a team at the beginning of the season, second was their first dual meet against a competitive high school, third was Qualifying for the State Championship and the Four and final one was the State Championship. though these are extremely important events in their season and lives, if one wasn’t keeping up completely with the story they would’ve thought it was nearly impossible for a team to make it to California State Championship after just a few races. Maybe putting the dates next to each event to show the sequence in which it happened would’ve been a lot better and easier to understand.
Although, that was the only flaw that was seen in the movie. mostly all of the decisions made for this film were really wise and showed an amazing performance. Disney has made another hit movie and even though their TV shows are becoming more and more disappointing with each season, they are doing so much better with their films.
McFarland USA is rated PG and is in theatres today after releasing February 20, 2015 and though the movie had missed 4 million dollars from box office to get even with the budget, the movie is still worth seeing and the budget debt shouldn’t keep people away from the great culture of McFarland USA.
