So you’ve been drafted. You are ready to start contract negotiations. You’ll need an agent, and there’s no one better than Jerry Maguire!
Jerry Maguire is written and directed by Cameron Crowe and stars Tom Cruise in the title role, with Rene Zellweger, and Cuba Gooding, Jr. In supporting roles are Bonnie Hunt, Kelly Preston, Jay Mohr, and a ton of well-known sports personalities in cameos.
Jerry Maguire is about a sports agent who has a moral crisis and works towards making his agency better with less money and more caring towards their clients. This comes after one of his clients gets injured and he superficially tells his son that he’ll be just fine, only to be cussed out by a 10-year-old. He gets fired for his mission statement and has to branch out on his own, with only Dorothy Boyd (Zellweger) going with him to start his new agency. His only client is Rod Tidwell (Gooding), an aging receiver who needs to make his big contract to set up his family.
The rest of the movie is a journey of both Maguire’s love life and his self-discovery, as well as the superficial issues with sports representation. It was huge back in the day and I’m sure most of you remember the catchphrases that were all over the place in the late 90s. “Show me the money!” and “You had me at hello!” The question is, does it hold up?
Well quite frankly, yes. After all the dust has settled and the catchphrases have faded into memory, it’s funny to me that this movie hasn’t really stuck. Hell, I haven’t seen it in probably 20 years. It just fell off the planet. But rewatching after all these years, it really has some great moments.
For instance, Jerry may have the moment that starts him down the road of being a better agent but that doesn’t mean old habits don’t die hard. He still coddles Tidwell at first and it isn’t until he finally tells Tidwell off, to start treating the game with the same passion and effort he treats his family, that Tidwell finally gets it right. He’s shown the money when he stops demanding everyone do that.
The catchphrase is actually discredited throughout the course of the moviem and people forget about that.
Overall I really enjoyed revisiting this piece of 90s history. The technology and times seem so different now in a lot of ways. It’s still a classic and I recommend it taking a trip back. Cruise is at his best in this and, if we’re honest, he does have a limited range.
Zellweger broke out and became a huge star from this, though it’s faded a bit in recent years. And let’s not forget the rise of Jonathan Lipnicki as the most ubiquitous child star for the next 5 years or so.
Gooding is amazing in this and I can’t figure out why he was never able to attain anything close to this performance ever again. I assume most of it was his choice of projects, most of which were absolute shit. Of course, Cruise would become a major action star with every film making the public wonder if the stunts were actually a cry for help.
Take a trip back and see if you still enjoy it as much back then. Or if it was a grating, overhyped movie for the time, maybe you might find you like it now that it’s not screaming its catchphrase on every show and commercial anymore.
