We Are Marshall

Drama set in Huntingdon, West Virginia, telling the true story of Marshall University's 'Thunder Herd' football team. For the team and the community, Marshall football is more than just a sport: it's a way of life. But on a fateful night in 1970, while travelling back to Huntingdon after a game in North Carolina, 75 members of Marshall's football team and coaching staff were killed in a plane crash. As those left behind struggled to cope with the devastating loss of their loved ones, the grieving families found hope and strength in the leadership of Jack Lengyel (Matthew McConaughey), a young coach who was determined to rebuild Marshall's football programme and, in the process, help to heal a community. There seems to be no end to "beating-the-odds" American football movies these days, but We Are Marshall, based on a true story, is in the top tier of that clutch of movies. Matthew McConaughey plays Jack Lengyel, who becomes head coach--more or less by default--of Marshall University's rebuilding varsity American football team in Huntington, West Virginia, after the school's 37-member team and coaches (and a number of others) die in a plane crash in the Appalachian Mountains on November 14, 1970. Facing an indifferent college president (David Strathairn) ready to shut the football program down, a morose assistant coach (Matthew Fox of Lost fame), and a charged-up player (Anthony Mackie) who missed the doomed flight due to an injury, Lengyel is faced with fielding a new team and putting the players through their paces. There are the usual, perhaps too-familiar, training montages and field action, but screenwriter Jamie Linden and director McG (Charlie's Angels) also draw some very good performances from the likes of Kate Mara and Ian McShane, contributing to an emotional tapestry conveying a powerful sense of how such a sizable loss affects a small community. --Sally Giles The West Virginia town of Huntington is devastated after a plane crash wipes out the beloved Marshall University football team, their Thundering Herd. With the town and university devastated, it falls to one man whojust wanted to help, to re-build the football team and the university spirit.