The Four Some : Golf Comedy : Widescreen Edition

• Widescreen

BASED ON THE TRUE STORY OF GOLF ICON BOBBY JONES. JONES OVERCOMES HIS OWN INTENSE PASSION, PERFECTIONIS TENDENCIES &FIERCE TEMPER TO MASTER THE GAME. WHEN JONES REALIZES THAT HISUNPARALLELED SUCCESS IS DESTROYING HIS LOVED ONES, HES PRESENTEDWITH AN ASTOUNDING PROPOSITION, ONE THAT SHOCKS THE WORLD.Anyone who's ever been passionate about golf will find something to admire in Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius, a staidly reverent biopic about one of the game's greatest champions. In the title role, Jim Caviezel suffers almost as much as he did in The Passion of the Christ, portraying Jones--who made history by winning golf's elusive Grand Slam (four top tournaments in less than four months) in 1930--as a passionately committed golfer who silently endured chronic pain (a spinal disorder prompted his early retirement at age 28), stomach ailments, emotional torment, and border! line alcoholism while maintaining amateur status in the sport he so magnificently dominated. Jeremy Northam brings much-needed levity and rakish style as Jones' friend and rival golfer Walter Hagen, and Malcolm McDowell adds colorful character as Jones' friend and biographer O.B. Keeler while Claire Forlani suffers the typical biopic plight of the hero's wife, who offers compassionate empathy while wishing Jones had more time for family. With repetitive golf scenes and a somber tone of martyrdom, Bobby Jones was partially financed by Jones' estate, which may explain its respectable dullness and instant fate as a box-office dud. Still, director Rowdy (Road House) Herrington is clearly enamored of his subject, and some of that enthusiasm shines through the gloom. --Jeff ShannonAnyone who's ever been passionate about golf will find something to admire in Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius, a staidly reverent biopic about one of the game's greatest champi! ons. In the title role, Jim Caviezel suffers almost as much as! he did in The Passion of the Christ, portraying Jones--who made history by winning golf's elusive Grand Slam (four top tournaments in less than four months) in 1930--as a passionately committed golfer who silently endured chronic pain (a spinal disorder prompted his early retirement at age 28), stomach ailments, emotional torment, and borderline alcoholism while maintaining amateur status in the sport he so magnificently dominated. Jeremy Northam brings much-needed levity and rakish style as Jones' friend and rival golfer Walter Hagen, and Malcolm McDowell adds colorful character as Jones' friend and biographer O.B. Keeler while Claire Forlani suffers the typical biopic plight of the hero's wife, who offers compassionate empathy while wishing Jones had more time for family. With repetitive golf scenes and a somber tone of martyrdom, Bobby Jones was partially financed by Jones' estate, which may explain its respectable dullness and instant fate as a box-office dud. Sti! ll, director Rowdy (Road House) Herrington is clearly enamored of his subject, and some of that enthusiasm shines through the gloom. --Jeff ShannonCasual of pace, endlessly nuanced and often elegiac in tone, the game of golf is hardly the stuff of sure-fire Hollywood box office. Writer-director Rowdy Herrington's biopic of legendary links boy-phenom Bobby Jones (who retired at 28) turns instead on the inner demons and driving compulsion that made Jones arguably the greatest golfer in history. This interior-out approach requires a deft hand in scoring, and veteran James Horner imbues his cues here with a graceful, impressionistic restraint that recalls some of Rachel Portman's similarly shaded work. The composer's musical motif for Jones is a rising melodic figure for orchestra that shines with courage and resolve, one Horner returns to frequently in a score that manages to fuse traditional ethnic motifs with a modernist's pastoralism, traditional s! coring foundations with contemporary pop vibrancy. The openin! g "St. A ndrews" immediately sets the dramatic tone, interweaving Horner's main theme with fiddle and pennywistle flourishes, all the while stirring up a decidedly brooding undercurrent. "Destined for Greatness" weaves the ethnic touches into a rich interplay of themes powered by a Vangelis-like rhthymic urgency, while "A Win, Finally!" marches them proudly front and center. Music for most sports dramas rises to thunderous crescendos in their moments of ultimate triumph, but the triptych of cues that close this one find Horner digging ever deeper into Jones' complex soul with fragile, introspective music that serves as a tender, bittersweet elegy for the golfing great. --Jerry McCulleyMuseum Quality Framed Art PicturesWhen four buddies reunite for the first time at their college reunion, they are immediately challenged by Rick Foster (Kevin Dillon) who didn't come to laugh about old times, but to win some cash in a not-so-friendly game of All-American golf. Their care! free days of college come crashing into the realities of adulthood during this wild golfing weekend where these old friends rediscover what they've lost on the Back Nine of life.