By John Corrado

★★½ (out of 4)

George Clooney’s latest film as a director, The Boys in the Boat is a familiar but mostly enjoyable underdog sports movie that serves as another they don’t make ’em like they used to effort from the actor turned filmmaker, following his coming-of-age drama The Tender Bar.

Adapted from Daniel James Brown’s non-fiction book of the same name, The Boys in the Boat tells the true story of the University of Washington junior varsity rowing team, who competed for the United States at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.

The story centres around Joe Rantz (Callum Turner), a working class engineering student who is struggling to keep paying for his classes, and sleeping in an old car. Joe begins to train for a spot on the athletic team when classmate Roger Morris (Sam Strike) tells him their might be some money in joining the eight man crew rowing team.

They are guided by tough but fair coach Al Ulbrickson (Joel Edgerton), with wisdom and encouragement provided by George Pocock (Peter Guinness), the older man who builds the boats for the team. The 1936 Olympics have added significance because of the symbolism behind America defeating Nazi Germany in the games. Clooney’s film acknowledges this imperative of the team doing well as a moral victory (Hitler is shown as a domineering figurehead overseeing the games).

Clooney has crafted an intentionally old fashioned picture; it’s a bit stodgy in places (including a mildly corny framing device), but works well enough as a traditional underdog sports drama. The adapted screenplay by Mark L. Smith (who also wrote Clooney’s sci-fi effort The Midnight Sky) offers some sports drama, a bit of romance with Joe’s classmate and childhood crush Joyce (Hadley Robinson), and good messages about teamwork and perseverance. Martin Ruhe’s cinematography has a classical look to it, matched by composer Alexandre Desplat’s pleasant musical score.

Clooney is able to wring some suspense out of the competition scenes, and the film showcases fine performances across the board. This feels like a movie that could have been released on Christmas Day three decades ago in the 1990s, and gone on to enjoy a long run on network television. This might sound like a backhanded compliment, but it’s more an acknowledgment of the type of movie this is trying to be. It’s a simple, old fashioned crowdpleaser, and there’s really nothing wrong with that.

The Boys in the Boat opens exclusively in theatres on December 25th.