New 'Brian's Song' comes up short
By Mike Scott
Assistant Sports Editor

Secure in my masculinity after knawing raw meat off a bone, marking my territory and talking about car engines for a few hours, I sat down this past weekend to watch Brian’s Song — both versions — for the first time. Surprisingly, after viewing both the original version and the brand new Disney-fied version, I escaped with said masculinity intact (well, that’s assuming I had some to begin with, but that’s another discussion for another time). Yes, surprisingly I did not break down and cry from watching the notorious old tear-jerker.

For those of you who don’t know (and send me your address so that I can find you and pull you out from under the rock you’ve been living under), Brian’s Song is the emotional story of the friendship between Gale Sayers and former Demon Deacon Brian Piccolo.
Sayers and Piccolo were rookie teammates on the Chicago Bears and the first players on that team of different races to room together. The story ends tragically with Piccolo’s premature death due to cancer. Disney’s remake of the classic aired at 7 p.m. Dec. 2. It starred Sean Maher as Piccolo and Mekhi Phifer as Sayers and will most likely be shown on campus next semester.

So, after recovering emotionally, I began to compare the two versions. There were many differences between the two. First off, the second one didn’t have the famous (and rather hilarious) scene where Piccolo sings our great university’s fight song. Right off, this confuses me a little bit. I was under the impression that what the title referred to in its literal sense was the Demon Deacon fight song, the song he sung in the cafeteria and the song he hummed while putting together Sayers’ weight machine (I know there’s probably some sort of deep sentimental metaphor between his song being the way he found joy in life or something equally sentimental, but I deal with facts, not frou frou-y stuff like that). Anyway, that was my first beef with ABC’s remake.

My second beef is with the way they plotted the movie. While the original showed almost exclusively Sayers and Piccolo interacting with each other, the new version focuses on developing the two characters more deeply, but in so doing neglects to delve deeply into the friendship that developed between the two players. This, in my opinion, was what made the original what it is. In the first one, the friendship between the two men is the essence of the movie, and it is because it has been shown and developed so much that the movie is as touching as it is. While it was nice to see more about what made each of the individuals tick, and it was touching to see the way that Piccolo interacted with his wife and family, I feel that the new version significantly altered the focus of the movie in neglecting the friendship between the two men. You shouldn’t alter a classic.

Next up is the acting. You can file this one under “This week’s sign that Apocalypse is upon us,” but I actually feel that Billy Dee “Colt .45” Williams significantly outperformed his counterpart in the remake. I know, I can’t believe I just typed those words either (I wonder if I’m getting a fever?). But, I thought Williams’ emotional scenes were actually pretty good. At least I did after watching Disney’s version. In the new one, everything seemed rushed. Williams took his time, and the pauses made his pain believeable.

Another issue I had with the new movie was the way in which it dealt with the topic of racism. In the original version, I felt it was more of an issue, and I thought one of the important parts was the way that Sayers and Piccolo dealt with it, often making light of it. In the Disney version, the topic seemed to be tiptoed around to some extent. I understand there are some things that Disney will not permit to be in its movies, but this was important. These guys were the first two teammates of different race to room together. The old movie showed how extraordinary they were by not only having them state that race didn’t matter, but by proving it in the way they went about making light of their situation.

Now, while I may seem to be picking the new version apart completely, it’s not as if it is worthless. It’s just that, like 99.9% of all remakes in the history of humanity, the original was a lot better. Had I not seen the first one before I watched ABC’s version, I would probably have thought it a decent movie, one that was mildly emotionally straining.

But, that is not a ringing endorsement when the original version is of the caliber of the old Brian’s Song. Sports Illustrated called the original one of the two times it is acceptable for a grown man to cry (the other being while watching Lou Gehrig’s farewell speech), and a middle-aged man once told me that if you didn’t cry when you watched Brian’s Song then you didn’t have a heart.

Anyway, my medical problems aside, while the new version of the movie is not horrible, I strongly prefer the old one.