The Money Shot Film Review: Rudy

Last Saturday, I sit down on the couch with my elite lunch of grilled cheese and Chef Boyardee Chili Mac only to see that Rudy had just begun on some channel. Since that is one of the finest sports movies ever created (nothing will ever beat Hoosiers), I turned it on. Now I’ve seen this movie at least ten times and it will always be great, but there were more than a few head-scratching moments for me. I’ve heard that Rudy was not really all that factual and I’m starting to believe how that could be. The crux of today’s post will be to point out the scenes that make no sense to me and other random observations. I’ve done this sort of thing before, if you recall, with my skewering of Teen Wolf, Little Big League, and Field of Dreams (for newbies, I recommend clicking on those three links just to see how this site has evolved).  Today, Rudy gets the same treatment.

*The best character in the whole movie is Rudy’s older brother, Frank. Frank correctly spends the entire film rolling his eyes at his little douche brother and treating him like shit. And he was totes justified to do so. We only get to see how annoying Rudy was for 2 hours. Can you imagine living with that guy? He’s a little shithead that constantly talks about Notre Dame football and thinks he’s too good for the steel mill! That would get old very fast.

*I still don’t understand why Rudy is meant to be some hero. Much like Doc Brown was a terrorist, Rudy was a criminal himself. He lied to get that equipment room job at ND (he was the original George O’Leary!) AND he broke into the janitor’s closet every night because he was homeless. B&E, trespassing, and being a lying sonofabitch…some role model.  He probably killed kids on windy days, too.

*Rudy and D-Bob become BFF’s at college and do everything but toss each other’s salad. I think their relationship was that D-Bob would help Rudy get into ND and Rudy would introduce him to chicks in return. Because, yeah, that happens. Next time that one of you single guys goes out looking for some strange, pick up a homeless guy first and then have him be your wing man. See how that works out for you. That is pretty much how it went down. If they were such great buds, how did D-Bob have no fucking clue that Rudy was living in a storage room? What a shitty friend that Jon Favreau was. All he cared about was getting laid and not that his buddy was a nomad.

*Speaking of D-Bob, he leaves college with this ugly broad and promises to come to the game whenever his loser friend dresses. Then he shows up to South Bend that day drinking champagne in a limo and the ugly chick is now hot. What the fuck happened in the 6 months that he was gone? Did D-Bob win the lottery? Did I miss this explanation? How did that brick of shit become a success virtually overnight? Who's the wild man now, huh?  You're both lame.  Now, let’s get into the football aspects of this movie:

*I loved skinny Vince Vaughn as the underachieving asshole that hates everything about Rudy. Second best character in the movie!

*Let’s talk about the scene where Rudy gets pissed because the big stud OL, Mateus, takes it easy on him on a practice play. So Mateus lays up on Rudy and little Danny Ruettiger gets pissed off because apparently he enjoys being murdered. Who wants to bet that the real Rudy has an entire room filled with snuff films? Then Rudy drops this gem to show-up an actual starter, “What are you doing? I'm playing defense for Purdue!” Uh, no, you are not. Purdue may be a terrible program, but their DE’s are three times the size of you. In fact, Rudy was doing nobody any good because crushing a little shit is not realistic to game conditions one bit. So in actuality, Rudy Ruettiger made Notre Dame worse by being on the team. FACT!

*And what coach would look at Rudy, who is half the size of most punters, and say, "Stick that guy at defensive end!" 

*How about we move along to the big game versus Georgia Tech now. First, there are two moments that really tug at my black heart strings and neither are what you think. When Rudy leads the team out of the tunnel and he makes eye contact with Charles S. Dutton, the black groundskeeper, whose name is Fortune apparently, and after his big sack when Fortune gives him three claps and walks away. Dutton can fucking act. Rudy sucks and Fortune made that movie.

*When Rudy’s stupid dad (who was the guy that got buttfucked by a hillbilly in Deliverance, by the way), walks into the stadium and looks out at the field, he has the nerve to say, “This is the most beautiful sight these eyes have ever seen!” GO FUCK YOURSELF, BIG DANIEL RUETTIGER.

*While the game with the Yellow Jackets is still in doubt, the camera flashes over to the aforementioned behemoth known as Mateus. He has the absolute DUMBEST look on his face in the history of ever. The only way I can describe it is that it was Bull from Night Court’s confused face but only a million times more confused. And Mateus starts the famous ROOOOO-dee chant which the crowd joins in on even though they have no idea why. Seriously, this is the 70’s, not more than ten people at that game knew why they were chanting for someone named Rudy. This just goes to show that Notre Dame football fans are nothing more than sheep.  Back to Mateus though, out of nowhere, he switches the cadence to his chanting. Instead of ROOOOO-dee, he starts yelling roo-DEEEEEE. This always kills me. Mateus was such an idiot.  He didn't even know how to pronounce Rudy.

*Dan Devine/Major League’s Eddie Harris puts skinny Vince Vaughn in to take a knee and end the game. Vaughn/O’Hara is apparently on Team Rudy though and wants the offense to run a goddamn halfback pass with 20 seconds left in a game that is over. They do. Dan Devine is beside himself and yells “WHAT DUH HELL GOIN’ ON OUT DERE?” This makes no sense unless they use the same formation for the halfback pass that they do for the kneel down (no one does). He should have called timeout once he saw that his players were up to no good. The NCAA really should have slapped Devine with a Failure To Monitor for that.  I really hope that the Georgia Tech coach punched Devine out after the game for being an asshole and running up the score.

*And now we’ve reached the moment when our beloved little loser finally gets to play for his beloved Irish. What a moment. The crowd erupts despite only knowing him as the little shit with the nice head of hair. Rudy’s teammates are so proud yet sad to know that they will never get to kill this kid in practice ever again. But how does Rudy react while running out for the kickoff? ARSENIO HALL FIST PUMPS, N-WORDS!!! I’ve got to be honest, his woo-woo-wooing nearly ruined the entire movie. All of that build-up to this amazing climax and it’s like Sean Astin put his dick in my mouth. BOOOOOOOO!!!

*The movie ends with Dan Ruettiger sacking the Jackets QB on the last play of the game. I’m sorry, but that’s horseshit. There is 5 seconds left and Notre Dame is up by 3 scores. Why would Georgia Tech be throwing the ball exactly? Did their coach, who is so focused on beating the shit out of Dan Devine in 30 seconds, draw up a play that counted for 21 points? No fucking way. They took a knee, dammit. I wipe Rudy’s sack from the record books.

End movie. With all of that being said, obviously I will still watch this movie occasionally. It still gives me chills. It can still make a lesser man than I cry like a bitch. But I don’t think I would recommend it to anyone. Why? It’s pretty simple actually. I don’t like the idea of anyone (especially myself) rooting for Notre Dame even if it is a movie. I’ve got to stick to my morals and my morals say “Fuck Notre Dame”.

Final Grade for a movie that came out in 1993 that all of you have already seen: 8.5 Thumbs Up!