I rarely watch football, typically only one or two times a year. Of course, I recognize that I am in the minority with respect to my disinterest in the sport. As far as I am concerned, football is mildly amusing -- on par with game shows and paranormal investigation programs; it's not too interesting but will do in a pinch. The primary disincentive to watching televised football is the investment of time required; the sport on TV is like playing golf -- it will use up three or more hours of your life and, of course, time is not something we are given in abundance.
On Thanksgiving, I felt lazy and didn't want to watch something that required much mental effort. (I recognize that you can apply all the acumen you might accord to a Bergman film to a football game if you have competency in the sport; my knowledge level is primitive and, so, mostly, I look without seeing.) I didn't expect to watch more than a quarter or so of the game between the Minnesota Vikings and the New England Patriots, but the competition was so exciting and evenly matched that I ended up glued to the TV for the whole proceedings -- I turned off the show after about 3 hours and 18 minutes, losing interest finally during the post-game festivities which are mostly self-aggrandizing, cloying, and maudlin (a tribute to the deceased John Madden).
My father had been a football star in his tiny town in central Nebraska and, so, he watched the sport on TV during season all day on Saturday and Sunday. He watched Monday night football as well and had season tickets to the Vikings. As a consequence, I saw a lot of football when I was growing up, albeit, mostly out of the corner of my eye. Times have changed with respect to presentation of these games, both on TV and at the stadium. They are now spectacularly produced, staged for the camera like the latest extravaganza by Michael Bay or Steven Spielberg. (When I was young, football plays were shot from a fixed position that provided a schematic view of the action, The camera was placed above the field at a slight angle to the line of scrimmage. There were lots of shots of cheerleaders and local dignitaries in the audience. Noteworthy events merited slow-motion replay.) The games are now directed to embody mini-dramas (will the goal-line defense succeed? will the kick-off result in a stunning return? can the beleaguered team make a first down on third and long yardage? how badly injured is the fallen player?) -- these dramas, intrinsic to the game, are shot from, at least, a half-dozen angles on the field and augmented with side-line shots showing players on the bench and coaches. As far as I observed, the filmmakers generally observe the 180 degree rule -- they don't cut to disorienting angles on the field and the action is generally organized around a classical master-shot, the old style aerial schematic of the opposing teams filmed at 20 degree angle from the line of scrimmage. The montage is dialectical in the Eisenstein-sense -- shot and counter-shot emphasizing the dynamics of conflict on the screen. Coverage is complete to the point of obstructing the main narrative on occasion: often, the innumerable camera angles record infractions that should be penalized but that were not observed by the referees on the field. (There are technical violations of the rules on every single play in professional football -- particularly with respect to pass interference and holding and, so, the referees have to make decisions as to what misconduct is so egregious as to warrant a penalty. This aspect of football is the most prone to corruption and I suspect that many games are sculpted by the officiating to achieve desired outcomes.) Sometimes, when the cameras pick up an egregious offense, this information seems relayed to the field and, then, there are challenges mounted -- decided, of course, by reference to the footage. On other occasions, the announcers merely note the infraction, comment on it, and the play on the field continues without interruption. Every notable play is replayed from various perspectives -- a football game is a lesson in epistemology: different perspectives yield different perceptions. Sometimes, the bravura camera-work is made part of the foreground: in the Thanksgiving game I watched, a big drone, apparently equipped with three or four lenses pointed in different directions hovered over the action. The drone was sponsored by Walmart and had a name: "the 4K Walmart drone." The drone, of course, is capable of sweeping Steadi-cam style shots over the field and creates a sense of the epic when it is deployed to provide an Olympian view of the heroics. There are three commentators, sometime filmed in a cramped shot that seems to be set nowhere in particular. One of the commentators provides a play-by-play account of the action; another provides technical information with a level of almost Talmudic detail; the third guy makes wise-cracks and provides background. The chemistry between the commentators is warm and mildly derisive -- the fiction is that these highly accomplished authorities are your buddies watching the show with you in your basement rec room.
The Thanksgiving Vikings v. Patriots game was conceived as a duel between Patriot's coach (Bill Belichick) and the Vikings head coach, Kevin O'Connell. The shots intercutting between the two men structured the presentation of the game. Both men are very photogenic and contrast well on-screen. Belichick is 70 years old, his brow perpetually furrowed and anxious. O'Connell is movie-star handsome -- he looks like an idealized Canadian Mounty -- and is only 37 (and looks much younger); he's huge and impressive and stalks around the sidelines like a panther, but, unlike the anxious-seeming Belichick, he seems to be having a good time. Both coaches are presented as master strategists and the game is shown to be the product of their imaginations -- they call the plays, substitute players, petition the referees and manage time-outs. The players themselves are conceived as obedient pawns to their commanders, the head-coaches. An additional level of drama arises from this match-up. O'Connell formerly played for Belichick and we are repeatedly told that he kept his "notebooks" as to pre-game briefings conducted by Belichick. There is an implication that O'Connell is using Belichick's own strategy against him.) O'Connell is described as not having been a particularly prepossessing player and there is, also, a slight implication that Belichick disrespected him when the younger man played on his team -- thus, the program presents an aspect of revenge or a grudge match between the two coaches. (I assume that this is purely fictional). In any event, the camera angles and cutting constructs the impression that the game is combat between the two men -- an impression enhanced by Belichick stolidly crossing the field, his worried expression unchanged, to congratulate O'Connell at the end of the game. (Belichick is half the size of O'Connell.)
Apparently, leering shots of cheerleaders are de riguer -- there was only one completely wholesome shot of a cheerleader in the entire three-hours plus presentation. And she was looking at the camera and leading a cheer -- it would be politically incorrect to film a cheerleader in a sexually exploitative manner and the girl's knowledge that she is being filmed is integral to the shot. Vikings' games appear to be 95% White -- there were no people of color filmed in 66,000 people in the stands. The games present a level of in-house majesty that I don't recall from the days when I attended Vikings' football in person. The fans are all dressed in purple and wear plastic hats with horns and blonde braids. There's an enormous horn mounted above the field that produces an ominous roaring drone -- this horn is supposedly derived from instruments sounded by medieval Vikings before combat. (The tiny Sunni Lee, a Hmong Olympic athlete from St. Paul was given the honor of sounding the horn before the festivities began.) The audience has a Skol chant that involves clapping their hands over their heads -- when all 66,000 people perform this ritual the effect is impressive. The stadium has spouts that can blast artificial snow over the audience enclosed in the vast colosseum -- an remembrance of the old days when football was played in frostbite conditions at Met Stadium. After the game, the most valuable players (MVP) were invited to a banquet table where they were supposed to eat giant, bronzed-looking turkey legs. (Something called a Turducken -- that is, boneless chicken put inside a boneless duck put inside a big turkey -- was served. There was a weird and indelible (vintage) shot of the football legend John Madden carving a Turducken with the side of his hand, stiffened as if to deliver a karate chop.) Two of the players couldn't eat the turkey because they had "grills" in their teeth. One of the Vikings spit out his bite of the turkey drumstick as too dry to be edible. At commercial breaks, a drone provides night-time shots of Minneapolis, including an ominous shot made by a drone cruising overhead down an empty Hennepin Avenue -- this has something of an apocalyptic feel to it. The shots of the illuminated Minneapolis skyline are taken from peculiar perspectives that are not familiar to people who actually live in the cities -- one involves a brightly lit arch bridge over some body of water. For the life of me, I wasn't able to figure where that picture was taken.
The football game had everything a fan would desire. There was a wonderful trick play run in the first series by the Vikings. A kick-off was returned for a 97 yard run to the endzone. When one team scored, the other team also obligingly scored so that the Vikings and Patriots were equally matched on the scoreboard throughout the entire game. The final score was Vikings 33 to Patriots 26.
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