J. Ann Tipton
Copy Editor
Unlike many movies, “Radio” hasn’t been marketed to highlight its stellar cast, amazing special effects, direction or huge budget. I saw the movie with the hope of meeting believable characters in a heart warming story that I could understand and appreciate. What I got was an inspirational yet anti-climactic after school special.
Cuba Gooding Jr. plays the title role of Radio, a mentally retarded young African-American who collects portable radios and spends his days pushing a shopping cart around the streets of Anderson, a rural South Carolina town. The story is set in 1976 and follows the relationship of Radio and the town’s high school football coach, Harold Jones (Ed Harris). After a few of Jones’ players mistreat Radio, the coach makes it his mission to help the disabled man. Radio becomes the unofficial mascot of the school’s football and basketball teams, inciting opposition from several parents and fans who say the football team’s poor performance is caused by Radio’s sideline antics. Jones faces the decision of continuing to mentor Radio or please the masses.
The basic premise for the movie is an old standby: the outcast must overcome adversity. The problem with this particular story, however, is that there are very few obstacles that stand in the way of Radio’s success. Every time Coach Jones’ motives are questioned or Radio’s potential danger to himself or others is pointed out, the problem is answered simply, “we will continue to help him because it’s the right thing to do.” In an ideal world, this answer would satisfy the whys, but the audience lives in an imperfect world and we want more.
Another large issue that wasn’t even dealt with in the movie was race. I wasn’t there to experience it, but rural South Carolina in the ‘70s was, I have no doubt, not the most accepting of black folks. Radio’s ethnicity was never an issue to the naysayers. Overlooking an issue as important as race left the movie feeling thin and overly sugary.
Character development was a sticky issue in the film. The relative shortness of the film (108 minutes) leaves the audience grasping for anything that can help in understanding why the characters do what they do. At the beginning of the film, Radio lives with little verbal communication with others. Over the course of just a few scenes, he becomes a beloved extrovert who acts as a sort of super-cheerleader at football games and even announces the daily lunch menu over the P.A. system at the high school. One of the other big problems in character development is that very little time is given to introduction of the characters themselves. The audience is supplied with only a minimum amount of information about Coach Jones: he’s a devoted football coach and a not-so-devoted husband and father. It’s only after the first 45 minutes of the movie that we learn he also teaches at the high school. Don’t ask me what he teaches, though. It’s never stated or implied.
The acting in the film is what kept it from being a complete disaster. Of all the actors’ performances, Ed Harris’ was the most consistent in his portrayal of a hard-nosed football coach who has a soft spot for the often mistreated and always ignored Radio. His role was believable and well cast, and his inward struggle of trying to figure out the right thing to do is as evident as his love for football.
Critics have looked forward to Cuba Gooding Jr.’s return to what they call “real acting” after taking several sketchy roles since “Jerry Maguire.” There were high hopes that this would be Gooding’s comeback role, but he didn’t quite hit the mark. Gooding’s physical transformation into the gentle, chipped-toothed, grinning disabled man was the most noteworthy part of his performance. His portrayal was a fair one; his range of emotions from abused animal and heartbroken son to excited child and cheerleader kept the audience genuinely interested in Radio and his social development. One of the biggest problems with Gooding performance was inconsistent language. The movie made it obvious that Radio’s talking should be difficult to understand, and Gooding sometimes spoke too clearly. He definitely didn’t have the consistency of Dustin Hoffman’s Rain Man or Sean Penn’s Sam.
The portrayal of small-town America was well researched and thoughtfully executed in the film. The politics involved in high school sports and the godlike way coaches and players were worshiped worked well. The town’s actions weren’t made to seem ridiculous, and the film allowed the audience to step back and look at the situation with objectivity and see that many people in the film were so caught up in themselves that they were blind to the needs of others.
The message of the movie is unquestionably a good one. The notion that a man as powerful as the football coach makes a conscious decision to put the needs of another above his own is decidedly counter-cultural. The interesting spin on this story is, however, that the rest of the movie seeps with the hard-working, hard-playing family values that many see as being essential to the American way. The filmmakers do an excellent job of meshing the two ideas in that the main character achieves a balance between athletic and personal achievement.
As a Christian, I saw the message of this movie as being a wake up call in my attitude toward people different than me. It took only one person to believe that someone like Radio could be more than simply the idiot who pushes a shopping cart around town. Jones took action and dove headlong into Radio’s life. He took the risk of losing his job and standing to help another, someone who couldn’t help himself. The movie made me examine my life to figure out where and when I can meet the needs of others.
“Radio” won’t be up for many awards this year, and it probably won’t become a classic. But I applaud the challenge that the film unashamedly puts before the viewer: develop a relationship with the outcast and take time to meet his needs. Regardless of my hang-ups with the movie, it’s a worthwhile see. Just don’t expect too much from it.