Harvard Man (2001)

Director:

James Toback

Writer (WGA):

James Toback (written by)

Release Date:

1 August 2001 (France)

Genre:

Comedy | Crime | Drama | Romance | Thriller

Tagline:

Passion, Seduction, Deception

Plot:

A basketball player strikes a deal with the mob to fix a basketball game.

Plot Keywords:

Basketball | Harvard | Philosophy | College | Cheerleader

Cast

Adrian Grenier	...	Alan Jensen
Sarah Michelle Gellar	...	Cindy Bandolini
Joey Lauren Adams	...	Chesney Cort
Eric Stoltz	...	Teddy Carter
Rebecca Gayheart	...	Kelly Morgan
Gianni Russo	...	Andrew Bandolini
Ray Allen	...	Marcus Blake
Michael Aparo	...	Russell
Scottie Epstein	...	Mario
John Neville	...	Dr. Reese
Polly Shannon	...	Juliet
Phillip Jarrett	...	Coach Preston
Adam Bloch	...	Kenner
Lauren Collis	...	Connie
Landy Cannon	...	Butch
Clé Bennett	...	Hal (as Cle Bennett)
Chantal Cousineau	...	Sandy
Maria Ricossa	...	Charlotte Jensen
Booth Savage	...	Steve Jensen
Mung-Ling Tsui	...	Reporter (as Mung Ling Tsui)
Brendan Ryder	...	Jonathan
Kelly Ryder	...	Jonathan's Mother
Kristi Angus	...	Bartender
Tara Samuel	...	Waitress
Ayanna Sealey	...	Coed #1
Jamie Holmes	...	Coed #2
Al Franken	...	Himself
Thomasin Franken	...	Al Franken's Daughter
Peter Mensah	...	Cyril the Butler
Joe Pingue	...	Joe
J. Miles Dale	...	Howie
Nick Bacon	...	Seth
Kate Crowley	...	Kate
Kimberly Pullis	...	Kimberly
Brian Schulz	...	Harvard Radio Broadcaster
Chris Wolfe	...	Harvard Radio Broadcaster
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Lyssa J. Caster	...	Girl in Stands (uncredited)
Rick Ducommun	...	Police Officer Martino (uncredited)
David Lauren	...	Man with Coffee (uncredited)
Nicholas Marino	...	Boy in Street (uncredited)
Manajhjanihe Royalle	...	College Student (uncredited)
Emily VanSonnenberg	...	Girl in Park (uncredited)
Kasia Vassos	...	Girl at Bar (uncredited)

Directed by
James Toback

Writing credits (WGA)
James Toback		(written by)

Produced by
Daniel Bigel	....	producer
Michael Burns	....	executive producer
J. Miles Dale	....	co-producer
Jeff Franks	....	associate producer
Donald Kushner	....	executive producer
Peter Locke	....	executive producer
Michael Mailer	....	producer
Phil Mittleman	....	co-executive producer
Edward R. Pressman	....	executive producer
Ron Rotholz	....	co-executive producer
Jeff Sackman	....	executive producer
Alinur Velidedeoglu	....	associate producer

Original Music by
Ryan Shore

Cinematography by
David M. Ferrara		(as David Ferrara)

Film Editing by
Suzy Elmiger

Casting by
Felicia Fasano
Anne McCarthy
Mary Vernieu

Production Design by
Rupert Lazarus

Costume Design by
Maxyne Baker

Makeup Department
Caryn Brostoff	....	makeup artist: Ms. Gellar (as Caryn Bardunias)
Elizabeth Cecchini	....	key hair stylist
Tim Mogg	....	makeup artist
Lisa Marie Rosenberg	....	hair stylist: Ms. Gellar (as Lisa M. Rosenberg)

Production Management
Victoria Harding	....	assistant production manager
Michael Wray	....	unit production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
David Eric Chapman	....	key second assistant director: US
Jill Girling	....	second assistant director
David McLeod	....	first assistant director
Sean Watson	....	third assistant director

Art Department
Bobby Anderson	....	picture car coordinator
Marilyn Hassen	....	assistant art director
Wayne Kimball	....	props
Adam Roffman	....	property master: Cambridge
Travis Staley	....	construction coordinator

Sound Department
Jamie Baker	....	adr recordist
Scott G.G. Haller	....	sound editor
Chris Miller	....	post-production sound services
Jonathan Miller	....	supervising sound editor
Brad North	....	sound effects editor
David Novack	....	sound re-recording mixer
Joel Reidy	....	boom operator
Martin Schloemer	....	adr recordist
Tom Williams	....	sound mixer: Boston
Byron Wilson	....	supervising sound editor
David Yonson	....	adr recordist (uncredited)

Special Effects by
Warren Keillor	....	special effects props

Visual Effects by
Penny Anderson	....	visual effects artist
Graham Cunningham	....	CG supervisor
Graham Cunningham	....	digital artist
Peter Hunt	....	visual effects
Darren Kirkness	....	visual effects artist
Earl Paraszczynec	....	digital artist
Stevie Ramone	....	digital compositor
Robin Trickett	....	visual effects coordinator
Wayne Trickett	....	visual effects supervisor

Stunts
Tye Tyukodi	....	stunt coordinator (as Anton Tyukodi)
Ron Webber	....	stunt double: Alan

Camera and Electrical Department
Jan Burgess	....	assistant camera
Jayson Clute	....	first assistant camera
Peter D'Angelo	....	grip
Tim Driscoll	....	key grip: Boston
David Fisher	....	gaffer
Michael Guerra	....	gaffer: Boston
Amanda Hannan	....	grip
Dan Hutchinson	....	electrician
Melanie Jeffrey	....	camera trainee
Larry McConkey	....	steadicam operator
John Medland	....	still photographer
Tim Metivier	....	first assistant camera: "a" camera
Mark Nener	....	second assistant camera
Mike Ohorodnyk	....	best boy grip
Brian A. Pitts	....	best boy electric: Boston
Paul Collins	....	grip (uncredited)

Casting Department
Larissa Giroux	....	casting associate: Canada

Costume and Wardrobe Department
Frank Avanzo	....	set costumer: Cambridge Ma.
Gayle Franklin	....	costume assistant set supervisor
Lindsay Jacobs	....	assistant costume designer
Aimee McCue	....	costumer

Editorial Department
Rob Evans	....	dailies colorist
Teresa Garber	....	director of post-production
Chris Miller	....	post-production services
Beatrice Sisul	....	associate editor
Bob Wenokur	....	post-production executive
Lee Wimer	....	color timer

Music Department
Jeanne DaSilva	....	music consultant
James Flatto	....	music editor

Transportation Department
Jeff Blake	....	driver: honeywagon
John Coles	....	driver

Other crew
Alan Abrams	....	business and legal affairs
Lyssa J. Caster	....	assistant: Ms. Gellar
Karen Chandler	....	first assistant accountant
Chris Connolly	....	development executive
Anna Dobkin	....	assistant location manager
Mary Donovan	....	assistant production coordinator
Jennifer Fraser	....	assistant to producer
Mary Fraser	....	production coordinator
Gail Gomez	....	assistant accountant
Christian Hamilton	....	assistant production coordinator
Lori Hornung	....	production coordinator: Massachusetts
Jeff N. Maclean	....	location manager
Scott Masterson	....	set production assistant
Sarah Anne Milliken	....	assistant to director
Sarah Anne Milliken	....	production assistant
Carol Pears	....	script supervisor

Production Companies

• Bigel / Mailer Films
• Kushner-Locke Company, The
• Lions Gate Films
• Worldwide Media

Distributors

• Cowboy Pictures (2002) (USA)
• DEJ Productions
• Kushner-Locke Company, The
• Lions Gate Films (USA)
• Madman Entertainment (2003) (Australia) (DVD)
• Metropolitan Filmexport (France)
• Sunfilm Entertainment (2002) (Germany) (DVD)
• United Paramount Network (UPN) (2005) (USA) (TV) (broadcast premiere)

Special Effects

• Sundog Films

Other Companies

• Film Finances  completion guarantor
• Hand Prop  props supplied by
• Law Offices of Alan Abrams  business and legal affairs
• Toronto Film Studios  movie studio
• William F. White International  grip and lighting equipment

Also Known As:

MPAA:

Rated R for drug use, language and some strong sexuality

Runtime:

99 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Canada:13+ (Québec) | Canada:14 (Nova Scotia) | Canada:R (Manitoba/Ontario) | Australia:MA | France:U | Germany:16 | New Zealand:R16 | Portugal:M/16 | Singapore:R21 | UK:18 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Company:

Bigel / Mailer Films

Trivia:

Rebecca Gayheart and Sarah Michelle Gellar star in this film and they also star in Scream 2 (1997) together.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: In the final scene by the river, the mother calls the little boy by his real name (Brendan), and not by the character's name (Jonathan), as shown in the credits.

Quotes:

Alan Jensen:I want to start looking out more and get away from just looking in-- contemplating the navel of my own void-- I want to look out at the world and see it and seize it and maybe even enrich it.

Soundtrack:

Well Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude and Fugue No. 13

like a mixed bag of nuts where you can't stop eating some, want to chuck others

James Toback has a wild spirit as a filmmaker and it lets itself out in Harvard Man in both the good and the bad that one finds in self-indulgent artists (I mean that as a compliment, sort of, since art has to be indulgent to a great degree). He takes a story of a basketball player at Harvard, Allan (Adrian Grenier), and transforms his conflicts with his multiple love interests (mob-daughter girlfriend played by Sarah Michelle Gellar, philosophy professor Joey Lauren Adams), his big gamble that he has to take a dive at a game to get his parents money for their house, the FBI after this backfires, and, mostly, his adventure into fifteen thousand milligrams of pure LSD, into a delirious little epic. Yes, epic.

Toback's style is all over the place from start to finish. His camera reaches up high and is usually moving, even when there is absolutely no real reason to. The excess in the camera movement is also complimented (or not) by an over-written script, which is something that doesn't happen usually unless a writer, like Toback, doesn't know when to stop with his characters. He compensates by having them talk fast (that or his editor takes out the little catch-my-breath beats in a conversation), and while not as annoying as the camera movements in most scenes in the first half of the film, it's noticeable. It's a filmmaker reaching far, maybe too far, into a realm of personal expression and putting the story into a modern setting - check the Bach mixed with rap and rock for more of that.

And yet it's hard to totally begrudge what Toback does get right here. When we're meant to take a lot of this seriously in the first half (the deep philosophical talk in Chesney's class about Kierkegard and Lichtenstein or that mob 'family' of caricatures), it's interesting but it never really works dramatically. But when Toback suddenly shifts the tone in the second half, when Allan takes the three cubes of LSD, it suddenly becomes a full-on comedy of errors and surprises. To be sure, some of the visual jokes and whacked-out faces that Allan sees could be attributed to the same style as Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, it still works. Especially funny is how Allan just seems to slip out of the FBI's hands (watch the one really strong scene of cinematography, sound, and acting all combined in the FBI interrogation room), and a masterpiece of a cameo appearance from Al Franken (like Toback also former Harvard alum).

It also helps with the comedy in the second half of the film that the acting, more or less, is pretty strong. Sarah Michelle Gellar actually gives one of her most convincing, well-rounded performances as a B-word whose intentions are not very well hidden but puffed up with rich-girl sass and sex appeal. Grenier also goes for broke as a guy with a good sense of himself, until he bugs out from the acid and runs all over town. Adams might be a little more of the one-note performance, the stable voice but not as intriguing as Gellar and Grenier in their roles. They're all put in a movie that is mixed up and has a lot to say about sex, drugs, life, living, betting, sports, and lots more. I respect Harvard Man, and if those trip-out scenes come on TV I'll be sure to watch again. But recommend? No. 5.5/10