Paterno movie starring Al Pacino on HBO

Good casting, especially with the wives and secretaries. Ugh I know so many women like that.

The poor kid who reported him got beat up and called a faggot by his fellow students. So sad.

They are making Paterno look doddering and clueless about the whole thing, they have him reading with a magnifying glass.

Kathy Bates could have played the secretary

I don't know why the family is up in arms, 90 minutes in the thing is a love letter to Joe Paterno.

Damnit only one glimpse of Dotty Sandusky!

I agree r6, they are making it look like Paterno was so wrapped up in coaching and was an old man who just didn't get it all.

Greg Gunberg has always been heavy but looks like he let himself go

Whoops at the end they guy said he told Paterno about Sandusky way back in 1976.

I'm not a big Penn State fan, but my recollection is that Paterno had been a figurehead coach for many years, and the actual coaching was done by his sons and other assistants, right?

Good performance by Pacino.

It was awful.

I thought it was good. Maybe they went a little easy on Paterno, but they also could've made him more sympathetic. I thought Riley Keough, the actress who played the reporter, was particularly effective. I looked her up, and was surprised to see she is the daughter of Lisa Marie Presley and Danny Keough.

Movie creeped me out, especially the very end where it's made clear how much Paterno had ignored.

I just wish I could believe that he was as remorseful as the movie showed him to be, but I bet he wasn't. I bet he went to his grave believing that the university paid him to win football games, not babysit every damn kid in town.

[quote]I bet he went to his grave believing that the university paid him to win football games, not babysit every damn kid in town.

That's funny but true, I can understand how he would feel that way too.

How was Pacino? Most of his best performances in the past 15 years or so have been on HBO so I’m hopeful.

r17 Pacino didn't chew the scenery in this part

I'd be interested to hear how it's being received on the football forums. It's certainly a cautionary tale that should be mandatory viewing for every major college football coach in the country. If Harbaugh or Sabin, or Urban Meyer think they're untouchable they need to watch this and see how a legend like Paterno crashed and burned in under a week (all the while focused on beating Nebraska).

I don't think there's a top program in the country without a body or two hidden in the cellar.

The first time I heard about Penn State was a long NPR story that started with what it's like to live in a party town, went onto the football obsession, and went on to talk about date rapes and party rapes being hushed up by the campus police. This was years before the Sandusky scandal hit, or the students rioted because Paterno got fired.

It sounds like a bizarre-universe version of a college town, where football and partying mean everything, and academics and ethics mean nothing.

Paterno was a bumbling old man, didn't care about the situation.

Let's face it, Paterno HAD to cover it up. Not that it was his responsibility in the first place. McQueery should have gone straight to the police.

Why the hell would he HAVE to cover it up, R22? If he'd fired Sandusky after the first complaint and encouraged the complaining parents to go to the police, everyone would have been happy except Sandusky.

I find Pacino sexy as hell

I do, too, but I think he's "off". I can't put it into words, but there's something odd about him. Reading a Diane Keaton's book just cemented that opinion. She appears to have adored him, but been perplexed by his oddness. Just weird little things like eating while standing up (?) and an almost OCD like focus/obsession on random things. He appeared to be ambivalent about their relationship.

I'm remembering a quote from Coppola about him. He wanted him for Apocalypse Now, but couldn't get him to commit. He said Al would only do it if they would film it in his apartment. This was in the 70's when Pacino was, not reclusive exactly, but suffering from extreme introversion. He seems much more outgoing now. Maybe he's medicated.

But still odd. An article from a few years ago talks about his house having practically no furniture or pictures on the wall. Sounded like a sparse college dorm room.. maybe he lives out of a suitcase. Maybe his fear of commitment covers residences as well as relationships.

Probably right, r23. But my point is this was A list college football, not an off-Broadway production of Oscar Wilde's Salome. Such a revelation would have been very damaging.

Intetesting, [R25]. You summed up my own general feelings about Pacino nicely.

Deeply respect him as an actor and will always really like him (and think he’s hot) but agree there’s something odd about him.

The Keaton relationship has always been interesting to me—as it seems he was the love of *her* life—and it seems to mirror most of his other relationships (lack of commitment, ambivalence, etc.)

Is there a childhood thing that explains his extreme aversion to commitment and his other eccentricities? (I know nothing about his upbringing or backstory).

Also wondering from what you described (the various small, odd behaviors) if he might be on the spectrum?

*Interesting

All I know of his childhood was that he was raised by his grandparents. His father left the family and his mother moved them to her parents place when he was a toddler. She was there, but sounds like not exactly present. She died young. I think I read at one time that she had been hospitalized after having a breakdown of some kind. I'm not sure. His dad sort of flitted in and out of his life.

Is he on the spectrum? I've wondered about that, but he is such a good actor. I've never acted, but I feel like a good actor would be especially observant of human nature and emotions, and I don't know if someone on the spectrum could manage that. But there are things about him that have me considering it. Diane Keaton also mentioned in her book or in an interview that he insisted on sameness. I've seen interviews where I thought he was strangely literal and somehow out of step with the interviewer like they were talking past each other. He has some idiosyncrasies in his speech. He can be strangely poetic and stream of consciousness abounds. Is he high? I don't know. Maybe ADD? There is something not quite right with him.

I thought the entire cast was great with the exception of the the girl who played the lead reporter.

Great information, [R25]/[R29]! I didn’t know any of that.

Yes, I agree that his mind seems to work in an odd way and wonder what that’s all about...

It sounds like his childhood and early family life was both unstable and unpredictable which now makes his relationships make a bit more sense.

I still don’t think Keaton ever really got over him; it’s sad really.

Thanks again for your great posts!

Keaton seems to be an odd duck herself

True, [R32]. I remember the DL gossip on her was that she was so burned by men that in recent years she mostly dates women. Don’t know if it’s true but I remember seeing pics of Keaton and Sarah Paulson at the concert in L.A. together shortly before Sarah started dating Holland Taylor...

You're being obtuse, R22/26. Sure, there would have been a scandal if Sandusky was fired early on and the reason got out, but Penn STate's drunken, football-obsessed fan base would have forgotten all about once there was a big win. Really, they worshipped Paterno and would have forgiven him everything - hell, they actually forgave him for keeping a pedo on the staff for decades, they demonstrated and rioted on his behalf when the scandal broke.

No, the whole bizarre business was like Watergate, in that the covering up of the crimes was what brought down the man at the top. Paterno was a FOOL to cover for Sandusky.