Release Date: October 24, 2003

Rated PG for mild language and thematic elements

Directed by: Michael Tollin

Starring: Cuba Gooding Jr., Ed Harris, Alfre Woodard, Debra Winger, S. Epatha Merkerson, Riley Smith, Sarah Drew, Chris Mulkey, Brent Sexton

Plot:
This is the decades-long story of the relationship between a prominent high school football coach (Harris) in a small South Carolina town and the illiterate, mentally-challenged man nicknamed Radio (Gooding) whom he mentors, who before that had always been the target of jokes and teasing by the community. Although their friendship raises some eyebrows at first, Radio's growth under the coach's guidance ultimately inspires the local townsfolk, from 1964 when he first starts helping the Hanna Yellow Jackets football team, through a 38+ career with the school that continues today.

Review:
Cuba Gooding Jr. plays James Kennedy who is mentally handicapped or in others words, retarded, not all there. And he plays it well, theres no arguing that, but it seems to me this film took way too much time setting up to show that he is retarded and too much time to show his interest towards football and loneliness.

Towards the end of the film is when they begin to teach James how to write and other things to improve his life. I guess you can say I wanted more of that nature. However, the presence of Cuba Gooding and Ed Harris is good without a doubt. They carry this film, for the half enjoyable ride that it was.

A flaw that made Radio fall down was the character development. While these characters were interesting in their own ways we don't feel for them whatsoever. To add to that, Cuba Gooding Jr's character is suppose to make you sad and care for his way of life, but instead it seems to not strike the audience as much as it should.

Cuba Gooding Jr. gives us a few laughs with his character and a warm feeling to some when we see the tragedies that happen. Theres a pretty big tragedy that happened and pretty much can change his and anyones life that it happens too. It is not a life we would like to live, but for being different so to speak, we must treat him with respect as we all should to non-handicapped people as well.

I enjoyed that Ed Harris wouldn't stop at anything to keep James with him and helping out the school. But the truth is, would they actually go so far that you can have the mentally handicapped that you found in the street say the lunch menu in school. Perhaps, most likely in a private school, but no way would it be allowed in a public school. This occurs in the film a number of times as it tries to capture the happy side of the audience.

Director Michael Tollin also loved to show the football team practicing and James helping out everyone. He would do this repeatedly and had repeated scenes of where they would hang out and repeated scenes in the restaurant. This lowered the chance to expand more on the problems with James Kennedy and highered the chance for us to see more of the relationship between Harold and James.

Stop crying and live life to the fullest little man.

Perhaps the point was to show how friendly Harold and James are to one another. I just expected to see more of a main focus on James and so we can see how he differs from the normal. I also have to say that this seemed like a turn from Hollywood. It seems the feeling of this actually being a true story was partially gone. We or at least I wanted to know James Kennedy's profile more than what this film gave us.

I also have never and I mean never seen as much eating and as much food than in this movie. That is part of what stopped it from being a good movie. It sounds absurd and ridiculous, but its actually the truth. The film concentrated too much in sillyness with food to advertise Burger King and not enough on showing James things he never knew how to do and on interacting with him. They injected humor in the restaurant scenes when James wants not one pie, but two pies. Was it to take away the feel of seriousness for this character or do the mentally challenged actually eat more than the non-mentally challenged?

The football season also went so quick and straight to the basketball season. Most of the football players play basketball as well. They tease James and then become friends with him later on and notice that he is not bad after all. No, I didn't spoil anything of the film, you should know that would occur in a true story.

All in all, Radio delivers some aspects that are interesting and the look and direction of the film is good. The script simply failed in the side that the audience truly wants to know about this mentally hadicapped man and therefore the film lacked in places that it should have succeeded in.

Radio falls short of being a good movie, but it certainly has a few interesting situations. Even for people who have a soft heart will find this film difficult to endure. A rental would definitely be more suitable for this movie if you truly are interested in it.

Radio

Rating: