When I saw the original Brian's Song film from 1971 with Billy Dee Williams and James Caan, I was entertained and very moved. I didn't see how they could have done a better job with a story like this. As it turns out, I was right, but I never thought it would be a portent of things to come. Remaking a masterpiece like the original begs the question, as Roger Ebert once said "Why are they remaking the good movies? Why not remake the bad ones?" This film is definitely a case in point.This version is, in a word, terrible. The writing is extremely bad, the acting is awful, and the scenes are dramatically shapeless. Most notably, the film was overtly miscast. The 1971 film was honest, but appropriate about the racial issues at the time, the remake is much too delicate and only seems worried about being politically correct and inoffensive. Sorry, but that doesn't make a realistic portrayal of the time period that this film is trying to illustrate.In the original, James Caan played Brian Piccolo as a likable, fun-loving, nice, loose guy with a good sense of humor and who loved life. Sean Maher's performance is a disgrace. In his performance, he makes Piccolo look like an annoying, ill-mannered, judgmental jerk. Mekhi Phifer is almost as bad as Gale Sayers, who makes him look like an on screen version of Deion Sanders. As the players in the movie put it, he does indeed come across as "uppity," flashy, and seemingly avoiding contact with others because he thinks he's better than they are, not because he's shy. Billy Dee Williams played Gale Sayers as the man he truly was: a quiet, unprepossessing, gentlemanly, shy type who simply felt awkward around people because he had trouble relating to them. I would've liked to have seen actors with personalities more similar to the characters portray these two players: like Rob Brown as Gale Sayers, and James Vanderbeek as Brian Piccolo.The coaches are portrayed as stiff, businesslike men with no affability, personality, or compassion for the players. Ben Gazzara is totally unconvincing as George Halas, and looks and speaks more like a priest than a pro football coach. The dialogue is truly insulting because it spells out what we already know about the players. Most of the time, the characters sound like actors reciting their lines and forcing information on the audience, instead of people who are speaking conversationally and expressing their true feelings.When Joy Piccolo says to Brian, after seeing Gale's acceptance speech for his rookie of the year award, "He's not arrogant, he's shy," it's useless information we already know. Another example: when Brian and Gale are running together to help rehabilitate Gale's injured knee, they're both expressing their worries, strengths, and weaknesses, most notably Gale's anxiety about life after football, and Brian's aspirations about when he'll actually be able to make his contribution to the team. These things were wisely never expressed in conversation in the original because the writing was intelligent enough to allow the audience to figure it out for themselves, without unnecessary discussion. Good films never use dialogue when they don't need to.Finally, the beautiful instrumental musical version of the song "The Hands of Time" elevated the mood and poignancy of the first movie, which the remake could've used more often. Why didn't they use the music again in more of this movie? This is an example of how music can magnify the illustration of a scene and ultimately enhance a story. This movie left a lot to be desired for, but a story as good as the first one needn't have been remade in the first place. I would recommend the 1971 film as a true timeless classic and one of the best sports movies of all time. The remake was just a bad idea that should have never happened.

I've seen both versions and the original is vastly superior. A lot of it is in the details which can never be recaptured. First of all, the original used many actual players, coaches, and team personnel from the Bears. Secondly, they filmed the training camp sequences on location at Rensselaer, IN's St. Joseph's College where the Bears used to train. The office that George Halas uses is the actual office the real George Halas used on campus! They used archival game film - none of this fake announcer stuff and re-enactments. I've heard some give credit to the new version for focusing more on the cancer element of the story. The heart of the story is not the cancer but the friendship between Piccolo and Sayers - a white rural man and a black man fighting for the same job in the 1960's. Some complain about the "racism" in the original version but to ignore that would be to ignore slavery in the Civil War - it's the racial element that made their friendship and their story so transcendental. Let me remind you that a racial comment is not necessarily a racist comment. There's a powerful scene in the original in which Gale Sayers is brought to tears from the laughter when Piccolo tries to call him a "n****r". They both realize the foolishness of the gesture and at that moment, their friendship takes an important step. We can't do that today, because someone might get offended. But if you're really honest with yourself, you can see where a word of such unspeakable hatred actually got turned on its ear and two men saw each other not for the color of their skin but for the content of their character. The new version didn't accomplish anything new - it just changed the movie to a story about cancer. The original is so much more than a football movie as it speaks to some very sensitive racial issues that Americans were grappling with in the 1960s - much of which was still living in defacto segregation.If you read Gale Sayers' book, I Am Third, which is the inspiration for this movie then you'll agree that the original version got it right.

It takes a lot to make me cry - I'm one of those people who can sit through a sob story with barely more than a lump in her throat and then shrug it off a few seconds later. Not with this movie though, because even though I finished watching it about half an hour ago, the thought of it brings tears straight back to my eyes. This is such a brilliant film about courage I think, more than the friendship by itself, and how that courage sustained a friendship most people wouldn't have through such an ordeal that simply didn't seem like it would ever get better.Sean Maher, is, without a doubt, brilliant in this film. In the beginning of the film I thought "yay, hot guy to tide me over in case this film is crap" but as it progressed, I was steadily becoming more aware of him as a character - a wholly believable character and by the end of the film I was crying for him, for his friendship, and for life in general. He had me so convinced that I can't help but be amazed. Although I knew what was coming by the time the film reached it's climax, it still shocked me because I was so distraught.I recommend this film to EVERYBODY, no matter what your film choices are. You just can't help but be touched by this film, and it's characters. It's not hard to believe that these characters are based on real people, and that the situations they face are real too.

This is one of the very few films that has made my eyes water with tears. The actors are great and deliver their lines with precision and all the emotion they have. Phifer and Maher may not really play football in life, but you wouldn't know it just by watching this movie. The film is also educational, as it teaches about the race boundaries of the time period and also about the medical world at that time. If you enjoyed Friday Night Lights, you'll also love Brian's Song! Anyone who loves a good sports movie should watch Brian's Song...as well as anyone who loves a tear-jerker. I rate Brian's Song with a 10 out of 10!