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.................... FILM SCENE ....................
FEVER
PITCH (1997)
Directed By David Evans
Starring Colin Firth, Ruth Gemmell, Mark Strong, Neal Pearson
In 1992,
Nick Hornby's autobiographical first novel, Fever Pitch, was issued to ecstatic
critical acclaim. The tale of the authors, boy to man, obsession with Arsenal
Football Club, told in diary format, was a dark, compelling and yet intensely
funny read. It changed middle class attitudes towards the beautiful game, and
in no small way helped give football the trendy image it enjoys today.
The film bearing the same title, also scripted by Hornby, is unavoidably a different ballgame altogether. Here, the bittersweet, personal outpourings of the book are swapped for a fictionalised, gentle love story.
Set in the
1988/89 football season, when Arsenal won the League Championship for the first
time in eighteen years. We meet Paul (Colin Firth), a thirty-something
schoolteacher, who wants nothing more from life than a season ticket to Highbury
and a roof over his head (in that order).
Changes are threatened, when he becomes involved with prudish new English teacher, Sarah (Ruth Gemmell). She doesn't understand his fixation with George Graham and the Gunners, and tries in vain to get him to grow up and seek a promotion at work, the idea of which seems absurd to Paul. Things come to a head when Paul learns he is to become a father, and has to finally face up to the prospect of a life measured in months and years, rather than football seasons.
There are some nice flashback sequences as the young Paul first visits Highbury during a day out with his estranged dad (Neal Pearson), and immediately falls in love with the place and the team. He insists on the same venue for subsequent visits, much to the bemusement of the father who cannot understand what his son sees in "boring Arsenal".
Good performances are turned in by the lead actors, as well as by Mark Strong, last seen as Tosker in Our Friends in the North, who plays Paul's equally Arsenal obsessed friend, Steve.
The film
climaxes with the very last game of the 1989 season, when Arsenal had to go
to Anfield and beat the then invincible Liverpool by two clear goals to win
the
championship. The excitement of what was one of the most thrilling nights in
sporting history is well captured by director, David Evans.
Fever Pitch the movie, won't make all time top tens the way the book does. But
it is an enjoyable, heart-warming little film, which is better suited to video
than to the bigger screen.
John Prendergast ©1998