By Audrey Fleming

Caution: Spoilers ahead.

Based on the true story of a 1987 cross country team in McFarland, California, McFarland USA tells the story of a poor, Latino, underdog cross country team that goes on to win it all. The film, released in February 2015, was directed by New Zealand film director and screenwriter Niki Caro. The film follows Jim White, portrayed by award-winning actor, director, and amateur musician Kevin Costner, as he moves to McFarland and takes his new job teaching at Whitney High School.

Costner is most well-known for his films Field of Dreams, Dances WIth Wolves, and Bull Durham. The Whitney High School cross country team, led by Costner as White, consists of Ramiro Rodriguez as Danny Diaz, Raphael Martinez as David Diaz, Carlos Pratts as Thomas Valles, Johnny Ortiz as Jose Cardenas, Hector Duran as Johnny Sameniego, Sergio Avelar as Victor Puentes, and Michael Aguero as Damacio Diaz. 

Image credit: Walt Disney Pictures

The movie starts out in the locker room of a losing high school football team, where White gets into an altercation with one of his players, ultimately losing his job. White and his family move to McFarland, a struggling and predominantly Latino town in California, where he takes his new job as the physical education teacher at Whitney. In his physical education class, he notices a few strong runners and convinces seven boys to join the first-ever cross country team at the school. Initially, White has trouble connecting with the boys, who are unmotivated and busy with family responsibilities. However, once White realizes that the boys have complicated and diverse home lives, his perspective shifts. Many of the boys get up before sunrise to help in the field, harvesting almonds before school. In an attempt to understand their lifestyle, White gets up in the morning to help the Diaz family in the field. After seeing White’s attempts to connect with them, the boys on the team grow close to him and accept him as their mentor. They begin to see cross country as a sense of community and as they put in the work, they begin to win. This teaches them that they have potential and with hard work, they can reach it. The team goes on to win the first cross country state championship in California. 

While watching the film, I noticed several themes within the movie, the most prominent being that with hard work and dedication comes success. The movie was an example of an underdog story in which the less fortunate, less likely to win team shows everyone what they were capable of all along. To me, it was inspiring to see a group of people put everything they had into achieving something and have it pay off in the end.

Photo credit: Walt Disney Pictures.

Middle School English teacher and Collegiate junior varsity cross country coach Rives Fleming (‘83) agrees, saying “As a cross country coach, I thought it was great to see an inspirational movie based on such a great story and sport. It really showed what hard work and commitment can accomplish.” Steward School senior and former cross country runner Mitch Larro agreed that hard work pays off, saying “Knowing that you gave the race everything you had is a great feeling, especially when I placed well.”

A common criticism of McFarland USA is calling it a “white savior” movie. Peter Canavese, a Rotten Tomatoes movie critic, says, “What could be an inspirational teacher-student, coach-player story keeps playing the race card of simple non-whites not being able to see their own way to prosperity without a guiding white light, who in turn learns from their unsophisticated purity.”

However, I thought the movie portrayed more of a mentor-mentee relationship than a savior-saved relationship. What distinguishes Coach White from a white savior role in the movie is the fact that rather than explaining to the boys how to make their life better, he strove to understand their situations. Rather than coming in and solving their problems, he learns about their struggles and lifestyles and joins them in their early-morning work in the fields. White doesn’t save the boys; they save themselves. White simply serves as a mentor who tells the boys that whatever they want to accomplish, they already have within them. 

My only criticism of the movie is that some scenes were made to be more dramatic than they were in real life. For example, at the end of the movie, the slowest runner on the team defies all odds and moves from close to last to finishing fifth out of the whole group. Fleming agrees, saying, “As with many movies, I did think they ‘Hollywooded up’ some scenes to make them more dramatic, but for the most part I thought it did a great job of telling an inspirational story.”