But by discovering that it can’t live up to the motto of Marshall’s previous coach – “Winning is everything” – the young team also learns that, in the words of the new regime, “What matters is that we play the game.”

Such reorienting of expectations would be more commendable if the film didn’t resort to scenes of improbable victory, along with a coda listing the team’s great success in subsequent decades. The team “rose from the ashes,” as a narrator puts it in the closing moments of the film – but the movie burns out too early. News footage of the aftermath of the 1970 plane crash plays over the end credits – a stark reminder of the grim reality that is the basis for the Hollywood-ized version of the story we’ve just seen. As with the newsreel footage included in Bobby earlier this year, it makes the surrounding drama seem weak by comparison.

McConaughey’s performance, more flat than fiery, is the weakest link, but Ian McShane lends some acting heft to the proceedings as a grieving father who forms a special bonds with his deceased son’s fiancée (Kate Mara). However, Kimberly Williams-Paisley is once again reduced to a smiling spouse (as she was earlier this year in How to Eat Fried Green Worms ) whose performance consists almost entirely of a few reaction shots of her cheering from the Marshall stands.

We Are Marshall isn’t terrible, but it fails to measure up to the more effective sports movies of recent years. Considering the powerful true story that inspired the film, the movie’s lack of distinction is a little disappointing.

AUDIENCE:  Teens and up

CAUTIONS:

• Language/Profanity:  Several profanities. Lord’s name taken in vain.
• Drugs/Alcohol:  Beer is purchased and consumed by college students.
• Sex/Nudity:  Some kissing.
• Violence:  Football contact; a young boy with a helmet runs into a tree; a baseball collision at home plate; a fist fight in a locker room.
• Spirituality:  Church funeral services; a prayer over a stadium PA system; coaches attend the same church; a man mentions that he was baptized in the Ohio River; talk of the deceased teammates watching the players from above; a sign reads, “The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away.”