The Damned United (2009)

Director:

Tom Hooper

Writers:

Peter Morgan (screenplay)
David Peace (novel)

Release Date:

27 March 2009 (UK)

Genre:

Biography | Drama | Sport

Tagline:

"They love me for what I'm not... ...they hate me for what I am."

Plot:

A look at Brian Clough's 44-day reign as the coach of Leeds United.

Plot Keywords:

Leeds | Yorkshire | Football | Soccer Star | England

Awards:

3 nominations

Cast

Colm Meaney	...	Don Revie
Henry Goodman	...	Manny Cussins
David Roper	...	Sam Bolton
Jimmy Reddington	...	Keith Archer
Oliver Stokes	...	Nigel Clough
Ryan Day	...	Simon Clough
Michael Sheen	...	Brian Clough
Mark Bazeley	...	Austin Mitchell
Timothy Spall	...	Peter Taylor
Maurice Roëves	...	Jimmy Gordon
Stephen Graham	...	Billy Bremner
Peter McDonald	...	Johnny Giles
Mark Cameron	...	Norman Hunter
Frank Skillin	...	Younger Nigel Clough
Dylan Van Hoof	...	Younger Simon Clough

MPAA:

Rated R for language.

Runtime:

98 min

Country:

UK | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

UK:15 | Ireland:15A | USA:R (certificate #45085) | Portugal:M/12 | Finland:K-11 | Canada:14A (Alberta/Ontario) | Canada:G (Quebec) | Canada:14A (Ontario) | Sweden:7 | Singapore:NC-16

Filming Locations:

Derbyshire, England, UK

Company:

BBC Films

Trivia:

The scenes in the film set at the Derby County training ground were actually filmed in Leeds at a football pitch ironically overlooking the Leeds United stadium.

Goofs:

Factual errors: Brian Clough seems to resign on behalf of Peter Taylor in the film, but English law makes it impossible to resign on behalf of another person.

Quotes:

Brian Clough: Things are going to be a little different around here... without Don.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Siskel & Ebert & the Movies: (2009-10-17)" (2009)

Soundtrack:

Flight of the Rat

A perfect movie for me

I had a few reservations about this film. Firstly we have seen Michael Sheen play a number of real life people in the last couple of years. Would it be possible for Sheen to cast aside these previous roles and play another big well known (in the UK) character in Brian Clough. I also had the distinct feeling that this may be a made for TV film that was bumped up to a theatrical release based on Sheen's recent success. My final reservation was whether the football would look good as it is frequently very poor when played by actors.

I have got to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the film. The main focus of the film is the relationship between the young pretender in football management Clough and the master in Don Revie the Manager of Leeds United. The film focuses on Clough's short tenure as the manager of Leeds after replacing Revie in 1974. The lead performances by Sheen and Meaney are excellent and it is at least as enthralling as the Frost/Nixon interplay.

It is a perfect film for me as it covers a period when my football passion was at its peak as I was about 10 years old at the time. As for the reservations I had nothing to worry about with Sheen. He transforms into Clough and it is truly a remarkable portrayal. I still tend to think that the film wouldn't lose very much on the small screen. Finally the film cleverly uses real life footage and we see very little of the actors playing football. That's probably just as well as they seemed a little older than the real players were. I'll have to check their bios to confirm that, but Bremner and Clarke looked the wrong side of 40 to me.

I suspect that to get the most out of the film you'll probably need to like football, but if you do you're more or less guaranteed to enjoy it.