THE LONGEST YARD (1974)

At a time as revolutionary as 1974, it seems strange that a film as uncomplicated as The Longest Yard could have been made. In the same year that The Conversation, The Parallax View, and Chinatown challenged their country’s authority figures, The Longest Yard was a film that extolled the virtues of American tradition, national values, and masculinity.

What one thing connects all three of these? Football, of course. After Paul Crewe (Burt Reynolds) is sent to prison for drink-driving, reckless endangerment, and assaulting a police officer, Warden Rudolph Hazen (Eddie Albert) requests his services as an esteemed ex-football player. Tasked with turning the convicts into a competent team so that they can play against the prison guards, Paul only has a month to pull off the job… and achieve redemption.

There’s a lot in The Longest Yard that doesn’t work. There’s a relatively simplistic moral, from a time that largely chose to eschew easy answers. Weak editing and narrative structure ensure the film lulls where it shouldn’t, but skips past the more intriguing aspects of the story. But as far as easy viewing goes, The Longest Yard is at least entertaining and deserves credit for being one of the most formative sports films in US cinema.

This is partly because the story preaches at length about what constitutes American values. Indeed, though the crime that landed Paul in prison may have been a DUI and assault, everyone thought he was guilty well before he arrived in the slammer: it’s widely believed he colluded with gamblers to fix the score of a pivotal game. James “Caretaker” Farrell (James Hampton) edifies why no one respects Paul in prison: “All I’m saying is, you could’ve robbed banks, sold dope, or stole your grandmother’s pension checks and none of us would’ve minded. But shaving points off a football game… man, that’s un-American.”

It is intriguing how, amongst a group of murderers, arsonists, and other unsavoury characters, it’s made very clear that the greatest crime committed in the film is Paul’s penchant for cheating in organised sports. Of course, it’s not quite as simple as that; he’s betraying his team in a selfish bid to barter his freedom or line his own pockets.

This is viewed by everyone as capital punishment in a game that’s described as embodying all that “makes our country great.” He’s described by his girlfriend as a whore: “Everybody’s bought you!” Much like in On the Waterfront (1954), he was an athlete who sold his God-given physical gifts to the highest bidder. Above all else, this is worthy of eternal ignominy; he is forever marked as a man without honour.

This honour code, which is inextricably linked to the national ethos instrumental in the establishment of American society, is said to be found in two things: testicles. Nate Scarboro (Michael Conrad) reveals to Paul that it’s the one thing a man can truly lay claim to within the prison industrial complex: “You spend fourteen years in this tank, you begin to understand that you’ve only got two things left they can’t sweat out of you or beat out of you… your balls.”

I can understand where screenwriter Tracy Keenan Wynn was going with this parable. However, it mostly sounds like a dumbed-down version of the message in The Shawshank Redemption (1994). Moreover, Wynn never really elucidates what he thinks constitutes said manhood, nor how it is earned and protected. As a result, the film’s central thesis feels vague and undefined.

Most of this would be fine if it weren’t for the incredibly weak pacing present throughout the film. If we were distracted from the film’s superficial moral with a brisk narrative pace and entertaining drama, it wouldn’t be so obvious that neither Wynn nor Aldrich has much to say on the importance of integrity (outside of conversations about testicles, of course).

Unfortunately, the story often feels lethargic, weighed down by an accumulation of unassured editing and misguided direction. At times, scenes start and end almost entirely arbitrarily. There feels as though there’s little cohesion between scenes, as though they were all narrative non-sequiturs. Additionally, moments of drama aren’t allowed to build sufficiently. It’s slow where it shouldn’t be, and quick when our characters desperately need time to reflect.

The negative result of this is mostly felt in the characters. We want to get to know these people more deeply, but we simply aren’t provided the chance. Paul describes how he has suffered from a chronic case of apathy his whole life, but it’s never mentioned again. Even more egregiously, we don’t see a single character ruminate on their friend’s death, which feels quite bizarre. Instead of taking time to analyse character psychology and motivations, we spend 47 minutes on the final football game.

Having said all this, I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t entertained by the film, at least sometimes. Samson (Richard Kiel) standing gleefully over the unconscious prison guard after having clotheslined him into oblivion was very funny: “Hey! I think I broke his fucking neck!” Additionally, Reynolds revealing that he drove his car into the sea because he couldn’t find a car wash was amusing.

And while the final football game is certainly overlong, the finale is brilliantly directed. As the clock counts down more and more, we’re expertly manipulated into thinking that something may go wrong, even though the film’s been entirely predictable up to this point. If nothing else, it reveals the power of cinema.

While there are a lot of performances that deserve praise, there is simultaneously quite a bit of shoddy acting in The Longest Yard. This is arguably due to the rather weak script. Considering how Burt Reynolds had turned in the greatest performance of his career in Deliverance (1971) only three years prior, it feels strange that his showing here is so one-note. Regrettably, he simply isn’t given much to do except chew gum like a maniac.

Similarly, the great Eddie Albert is reduced to a caricature here, as he plays the warden with such hammy malice that it’s difficult to believe. His sadistic drive to punish his prisoners becomes a little cartoonish: “I want every prisoner in this institution to know what I mean by power, and who controls it.”

However, these two leading performances—one rather insipid, the other excessive—are salvaged by the great supporting cast. Richard Kiel’s buffoonish, yet kind Samson is brilliant, and Hampton as Caretaker provides heart to a story that was desperately lacking it. Finally, Harry Caesar as Granville serves as a believable foil to the solipsistic Paul Crewe.

Despite the predictable story, the film has left a legacy that is difficult to deny. Having been remade three different times—in Mean Machine (2001), The Longest Yard (2005), and Captain Masr (2015)—it’s evident that the story is popular. Perhaps it’s the combination of finding self-worth through physical trials, or redemption through sport, that so many find appealing. Indeed, many of us are drawn to sports for the personal stories that shine through the gameplay.

But there are other pure sports comedies, such as Slap Shot (1977), Kicking and Screaming (2005), and Semi-Pro (2008), which also owe a great debt to The Longest Yard. It’s impressive to note how, despite not featuring a plethora of laughs nor a heavy dose of emotion, the story managed to inspire many other filmmakers nonetheless.

Ultimately, The Longest Yard is by no means a great film, but it’s mostly an enjoyable one. Outside the bad pacing, lack of characterisation, and simplistic message, there’s a story of redemption that ticks enough boxes to remain easy to watch, even 50 years later.

USA | 1974 | 121 MINUTES | 1.85:1 | COLOUR | ENGLISH

Cast & Crew

director: Robert Aldrich.
writer: Tracy Keenan Wynn (story by Albert S. Ruddy).
starring: Burt Reynolds, Eddie Albert, Ed Lauter, Michael Conrad, James Hampton, Harry Caesar, John Steadman, Charles Tyner & Mike Henry.