Damned United

The Damned United

This was a fun movie to watch. I am personally a big soccer fan, and love to follow the sport as much as possible. This movie didn’t really focus on the athletes of soccer, or so much the game play itself, but more on the coaching and managing aspect of the game. Its not a foul movie, a few F-words every now and then, but for the most part a pretty clean movie and a fun watch.

This movie was directed by Tom Hooper, who did the John Adam series on HBO, and is doing the remake, or another version of East of Eden that’s coming out in 2009. The movie is about a loud mouth former English superstar taking over England's top football club Leeds United, previously successful manager Brian Clough's abrasive approach and his clear dislike of the players' dirty style of play make it certain there is going to be friction. Glimpses of his earlier career help explain both his hostility to previous manager Don Revie and how much he is missing right-hand man Peter Taylor who has loyally stayed with Brighton & Hove Albion.

If you are a soccer fan, especially one of Leeds United or the EPL in general, I would recommend seeing this movie. It isn’t a blockbuster, or anything special. It is an interesting movie, and a good glimpse on how some of the business side of football works. I learned some things from it actually, and it was a good piece of history to watch. It’s always fun to watch movies about soccer that actually happened.

I really enjoyed watching the flashbacks of the movie. It kept on going back and forth between his time at Derby and Leeds united. I thought that the writing was really good, and thought that Michael Sheen (Brian Clough) did an amazing job. He was supported very well by Timothy Spall (Peter Taylor) who is famous for Peter Pettigrew in the Harry Potter series. They worked really well as a team, and had many great English actors to carry the film on. The Leeds United football team really was full of douches, and they did a good job at being ones.

You know what, life is short, so go see this damn movie and enjoy it!!!