Touching the Ancient One

December 8, 2006

As a Marshall grad I’m naturally excited about the upcoming movie, “We Are Marshall,” and it’s getting some buzz now. In case you’re thinking that this is just another “football film,” you’d be wrong. Oprah Winfrey interviewed film star Matthew McConaughey on her Wednesday, December 6 show in which they showed some clips from the film that will come to the big screen on
December 22.

Marshall lost most of its football team in a tragic jet liner crash in 1970. The nation mourned on that weekend, then seemingly forgot. Not so Marshall University and the city of Huntington, West Virginia. The school, as in many college towns, is an extension of the city, and that was true even back in the fifties when I was there. After the crash, city and university struggled through their grief together to rebuild their team and their confidence. That’s what this movie is about.

Justin McElroy, in an article for The Herald-Dispatch quoted Oprah. She said, "That movie got me. I was trying not to let it get me, but it got me. I was trying not to cry out loud, but it got me."

“We Are Marshall” opens December 22.

Rupert