College Coach

This is a fairly predictable story about a mercenary college football coach who will jump at the best offer. Interesting that in the 1930's many of the issues surrounding collegiate sports are similar to what exists today. Pat O'Brien did his usual nice job, this time as a fast talking, somewhat unscrupulous coach. Just 75 minutes long and kept my interest.

College Coach (1933)

*** (out of 4)

Warner film about Coach James Gore (Pat O'Brien) who is hired by a college to turn their football team into winners. Gore is able to do this in one season but some of the trustees don't like how he did it. Fixing test scores, playing players to come to school and overlooking various other violations are just some of the ways of winning. Dick Powell plays a player who wants to play fair, Lyle Talbot is the star of the team who doesn't care if he's failing all his classes and Ann Dvorak plays Gore's wife. There's a lot to enjoy in this film even though there are still quite a few flaws. The strongest thing going are the performances, which are really strong and that includes O'Brien who comes off like a real coach. Talbot steals the film however as the ruthless idiot who only knows football. Even John Wayne and Joe Sawyer plays small parts as members of the team. It was weird watching a football game from this era in the way it was played compared to today and I'm not sure if it's true but the film gives some numbers as to how many people are killed playing the sport during this time, which was pretty shocking.

"Calvert University" is facing bankruptcy. The board of trustees regret putting money into a science laboratory instead of financing football. "A winning football team is the answer to our problems," they agree. Since the Calvert players haven't won a game in three years, the college hires hard-nosed coach Pat O'Brien (as James Gore) to heat up the gridiron. Singing chemistry major Dick Powell (as Philip "Phil" Sargeant) is star player and the son of headmaster Arthur Byron (as Phillip Sargeant). Brought in to beef up the team, Lyle Talbot (as Herbert "Buck" Weaver) laments that Mr. Powell can't cook as the two become roommates...

With some sissy spoken innuendos, Mr. Talbot seems to have an implicit sexual interest in Mr. Powell. Nothing happens there, apart from their fight being peculiarly shot from the waist down. Instead, Talbot becomes interested in Coach O'Brien's neglected wife, sexy Ann Dvorak (as Claire). She's hard to resist. Football players seem to pass exams without even turning in test papers, which irks Powell. Everything comes together for the climactic big game. John Wayne has a bit part after about 11 minutes, welcoming Powell to the picture. "College Coach" is interestingly immoral, and nicely directed by William A. Wellman.

****** College Coach (11/4/33) William A. Wellman ~ Pat O'Brien, Dick Powell, Lyle Talbot, Ann Dvorak

Seven years before Pat O'Brien played his most famous part as Knute Rockne he essayed the role of another college coach thereby giving same title to this flick. This guy is not the hero Rockne was. He's not above using a few dirty tactics to win a game. In a way this movie anticipates films like The Program, it's two generations ahead of it's time.

Dick Powell is also in this as a smart football player who realizes he's in college to get an education. Not so Lyle Talbot who has eyes for O'Brien's wife played by Ann Dvorak. He's a ringer that O'Brien's brought in to win games and O'Brien's so preoccupied with winning he doesn't see the moves Talbot's making.

Powell has one song to sing in this film, an item called Lonely Lane by Sammy Fain-Irving Kahal. Nice, but not up to the usual numbers Powell got in those Busby Berkeley extravaganzas.

Fans of John Wayne and Ward Bond will get a chance to see both of them as football players which is what they were when working as prop men at the studios for summer eating money when John Ford spotted both of them. Wayne was doing some B westerns for Warner Brothers at the time and this was one of a few films he appeared in as a supporting player. One of a small handful.

As I said, an interesting film and way ahead of it's time.

The cast of COLLEGE COACH (1933) reads like a veritable "Who's Who" of 1930s supporting players. Familiar faces abound, albeit in small parts. In this one film we see similar beefy types Guinn "Big Boy" Williams and Nat Pendleton side-by-side, along with Joe Sauers (Sawyer). I was thinking that all we were missing was Ward Bond in one of his early bit roles, but he turns up as well. (I'm sure the football-themed story had a lot to do with this assemblage.) The main stars are Pat O'Brien, Lyle Talbot, Dick Powell, and Ann Dvorak, who are supported by Hugh Herbert and Donald Meek. The unmistakable Herman Bing has a scene, and who has a brief exchange with Powell in an early scene but a young John Wayne.

The story involves a college hiring a hotshot football coach in hopes of generating enough revenue from the team's success to save the school. The plot is then driven by three characters: Pat O'Brien as the dirty coach who builds championship teams through unethical means, Lyle Talbot as the hotshot football star whose ego is an issue on the field and off, and Dick Powell as the honest student-athlete who's captain of the team and a wiz in the chemistry lab. Ann Dvorak is O'Brien's neglected wife who begins spending her free evenings with Talbot.

The movie seems to be sending some odd messages. O'Brien's coach is an unlikable character. He runs a racket building his football legacy. He secretly enlists paid athletes (mercenaries) for the school team and rigs their academic standing to keep them eligible to play. He has a publicist build up his public image while he runs crooked financial deals behind closed doors. His ruthless on-field tactics lead to tragedy. He hops from one school to its rival for a fatter paycheck. And on top of it all, he neglects his poor wife.

But it seems clear that Pat O'Brien is the star attraction of the movie and that the audience is meant to somehow sympathize with him. Toward the end of the movie, the audience is asked to root for one unlikable character (Talbot's show-off quarterback) to come to the rescue of another unlikable character (O'Brien, who's facing ruin without his star players). The only likable character in the mix is Powell, who wanders out of the plot for a while, before returning to save the school, not O'Brien. O'Brien deserved some sort of comeuppance. The script ultimately rewards his behavior.

This is a minor film from the Warner Bros. vaults, but worth checking out if one is a fan of any of the stars. It also offers an intriguing look at the game of football, circa 1933. The manual scoreboards seem so complicated (cluttered?).

Dick Powell, fresh off his successes in Busby Berkeley musicals, is pretty good as a clean-cut college student who's not afraid to get tough. He puts cocky teammate Talbot in his place on more than one occasion. The most interesting angle in the movie, I believe, is the relationship between the two. Two sides of the same coin. An odd couple. Teammates on the field, roommates off it. They hated each other's guts, but they joined forces at the end. Too bad this angle wasn't developed as much as it could have been, with Powell's character quickly losing relevance to the main Pat O'Brien plot.

The movie's okay, but nothing special. The cast of bit players is interesting for 1930s movie buffs. But it seems odd that the movie makes a hero out of such a shyster.