REVIEW: ‘Boys in the Boat’ bores more than it excites

It feels kind of bad to pile on Washington after they just lost the football national championship, but the review must go on.

“The Boys in the Boat” is set in the mid 30s, right in the middle of the Great Depression. The film begins by introducing Joe Rantz (Callum Turner), a student at the University of Washington who’s homeless and is having difficulty paying for his tuition. While looking for work, he finds he can make money for the semester by making the school’s rowing team.

After a grueling selection process, Rantz and seven others are picked for the JV team. Their coach, Al Ulbrickson (Joel Edgerton) puts them to work right away and soon learns they’re able to compete well with the varsity team. Because of their talent, the coach begins considering the JV squad to compete for a spot in the 1936 Olympics.

Sports movies can be a lot of fun. Sure they often feel familiar because of the usual things that happen, but it’s enjoyable seeing a group come together and satisfying when they succeed. However, while “The Boys in the Boat” feels familiar, it certainly wasn’t very enjoyable or satisfying.

Based on the book with the same title, the film is a hodgepodge of sports movie tropes, with the team being assembled, to their first touch of success, a training montage and their final triumph. But it shows all of this without any passion or personality.

For example, when a team comes together, there’s usually a variety of characters who an audience can grow to love and root for. But that doesn’t happen here. All of the characters on the team kind of blend together, other than Rantz who gets more attention than the others, and team member who’s one trait aside from rowing is playing the piano.

The former character mentioned is another gigantic problem with the film. The author of the book relied on interviews with Rantz when writing it, which seems to be why he’s the main character. And he’s a terrible protagonist. He’s the biggest stick-in-the-mud throughout the entire movie, rarely seeming to bond with his teammates or show much enthusiasm, even toward his relationship with his girlfriend.

As the movie shows, he has a difficult background, having been on his own since he was 14 and struggling with tuition. However, nearly the entire movie he’s just this moody guy on the team who occasionally cracks a smile. Turner doesn’t infuse the character with much charm or charisma either to show Rantz emerging as a leader or positive force on the squad.

With the rest of the team being barely distinguishable, it becomes hard to really embrace the group and find them endearing. This is such an important part of films like “Remember the Titans,” “Miracle,” “Coach Carter” and more. With this film on the other hand, it’s just going through the sports movie motions without any reason to be invested.

George Clooney, who directed, made some odd filmmaking decisions, too. For example, having a framing device that features an older Rantz at the beginning and end that adds very little and doesn’t even show what happened in his later life. The film also doesn’t inform the viewer about what happened to any of the other rowers at the conclusion.

Other examples include a short moment where the rowers meet Jesse Owens that was barely a minute long and felt like Clooney was obligated to add it, as well as exaggerated reaction shots of Adolf Hitler during the final race. None of this enhanced the movie.

But in all fairness to Clooney and his crew, they do tremendous work in recreating the rowing scenes. The race sequences are really exciting. There’s legitimate entertainment value during these set pieces, and it makes an audience appreciate what this team did on the world stage.

While the athletic moments offer some engagement and Joel Edgerton does alright as the head coach, “The Boys in the Boat” is a dull sports flick, sorely lacking flair and character. 2 out of 5.