Starring: Cole Hauser, Sean H. Scully, Annika Marks, Randall Battinkoff, Hallie Todd, Peter Onorati, Bob McCracken, Casey Moss, Michael John Madden
Distributor: Heritage Films
Runtime: 122 mins. Reviewed in Dec 2021
Reviewer: Fr Peter Malone msc
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True story of Olympic gold medal winner in wrestling, John Wright. Stripped of his medal because of drugtaking, Wright returns to his home town when his mother dies. Both shunned and welcomed, Wright eventually takes on the training of the high school wrestling team.
Some responses to The Last Champion have taken the either/or approach. It has depended on interests and background. One response has been to the film as a sports film, high school students and their coach. The other response has been to the personal journey of the coach, failure, regrets, possibilities for redemption. The best response, of course, is both/and a personal redemption story through sports and coaching.
John Wright won wrestling gold at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games. He had been a highly-awarded high school champion. After winning the gold medal, it was revealed that he had taken drugs and he was stripped of his metal. This information is quickly given in the opening minutes of the film, photos, newspaper headings, highlights.
However, the action of the film takes place 20 years later, when Wright (Hauser) returns to his hometown, Garfield, Washington State to organise the sale of the family home after the death of his mother.
Hauser is perhaps better known for thrillers and action films, but he is convincing in the role of Wright, especially in the early sequences where he is shunned by some of the and welcomed by others. His coach from high school invites Wright to a meal and gets him some work at the local fire station. In the meantime, we meet high school student, Michael Miller (Scully), who has been shoplifting, and get glimpses of his dysfunctional and sad mother (Todd, who co-wrote the screenplay with her husband and film director, Glenn Withrow, and their daughter Ivy – a family enterprise).
It is not difficult to see where the film is going – after all, it is based on an actual story. Which means that it may not appeal to an audience which is looking for more sophisticated twists. Rather, this is a story that all audiences can watch, identify with worry about, hope.
When the coach collapses and dies, it is obvious that Wright will be approached to work with the high school team. There is some complication because Wright is in financial need and he approaches a banker, friend from the past, who does a deal with Wright to help him financially and that he coach his son to be the state champion. There is a brutal scene, which Wright observes but does not intervene in, where Michael is bashed by three of the wrestling team. And this will weigh on Wright’s conscience.
This small-town America, folksy in many ways, and would have been called homespun in earlier decades. People still go to church. They do line-dancing. The large choir sings Christmas carols. The pastor (dressed in everyday clothes rather than formal) helps with people’s lives, his daughter Elizabeth (the obvious romantic interest) works in the surgery. People are kind and generous for the most part.
There is a church sequence with Wright trying to come to terms with his past and his present, actually confessing to the pastor and experiencing forgiveness. And his work, thorough and professional with the boys, is part of his atonement.
On the sports level, lots of wrestling sequences, training, matches, the state competition, the build-up to the final bout between Michael and the son of the banker…
This film has been welcomed by many audiences who want good stories, stories about goodness which do not overlook failings, a film which is edifying and inspiring.
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