New England Town Rallies Around Their High School Football Team

 NR | 1h 36min | Documentary, Sports | 16 December 2022 (USA)

Of all sports movies, the sub-genre with the fewest entries, but highest percentage of overall quality, is high school football.

With just 16 such titles identified on IMDb. com, six of them, “All the Right Moves,” “Friday Night Lights,” “Remember the Titans,” “The Blind Side,” “Varsity Blues,” and “School Ties,” are all excellent, and the lone documentary, “Undefeated,” went on the win a Best Documentary Feature Academy Award.

The players of St. Bernard’s football team surprised everyone, in “All In: Miracle at St. Bernard’s.”(Gravitas Ventures)

As with all similar movies before it, the documentary “All In: Miracle at St. Bernard’s” (AIMSB) contains human interest sub-plots which extend beyond the playing field, but here it is (almost) the main attraction.

Hard Times

Founded in 1920 in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, St. Bernard’s is a coed, multi-racial Catholic school which, like four other parochial high schools in North County, had fallen on hard times. In 2000, the enrollment exceeded 500, a number which dwindled to a mere 143 in 2018.

In the spring of 2019, the Diocese of Worcester, the arm of the local Catholic Church which provides funding to the school, informed the administrators and staff that it would be closed at the end of the school year. It is worth noting that the tuition per student per year is $8,550 and, as with all churches in the area, the school is required to give 10 percent of their entire income to the diocese.

This news was received as more-than-shocking by everyone, but no one more than Tom Bingham, the owner of a generations-old lumber mill and coach of the football team since 2001. Only months earlier, Bingham led the team to the state championship, it’s first since 1997, and did so with the smallest (both in player size and numbers) of any school in the state.

Principal Linda Anderson led the effort to save St. Bernard High School, in “All In: Miracle at St. Bernard’s.”(Gravitas Ventures)

At the ripe age of 26, former Latin teacher Linda Anderson had been appointed as the new principal before the closing announcement was made, and faced the possibility of never serving a single day in her new position, scheduled to begin in the fall.

A Sliver of Hope

The diocese did provide the slightest glimmer of hope to Bingham, Anderson, their staff, teachers, and students. If they would boost enrollment to at least 100 and raise enough money ($1 million) over the next 30 days to guarantee operating costs in the upcoming year, St. Bernard’s could remain open.

Like so many small towns across the land, the citizens of Fitchburg (secular and parochial alike) make heavy emotional investment in student athletic programs. Almost immediately, Anderson and the PTA realized fund raising would be contingent on the probable success or failure of the upcoming football season—one that might not even be played.

Coach Tom Bingham believes in the players of St. Bernard’s football team, in “All In: Miracle at St. Bernard’s.” (Gravitas Ventures)

Adding to Bingham’s already monumental challenge was the fact he’d lost eight players to graduation and would have to include incoming freshman on his squad, which would eventually number only 26, barely half of the national 45 player average.

For those unaware, St. Bernard is the patron saint of mountain climbing and it became more than a metaphor for everyone involved in keeping the school financially solvent.

Directors-writers-producers Gregg Backer and Evan Kanew craft their film with an observant, unobtrusive eye, which is not to say it is dispassionate or lacking in the honest portrayal of raw human emotion. Only the coldest of cynics could make it 30 minutes in and not be totally engrossed with what they witness.

Looking Down From Above

Sporting high-end (for a documentary) graphics and photography, the movie has a polished but never overly slick look. The use of drone cameras is particularly intriguing as they provide a “big-picture/God’s-eye” view of the community and its citizens, salt of the earth people who unapologetically subscribe to traditional values and those who believe the collective is much greater than the sum total of its parts.

As tense and nail-biting as any modern thriller, “AIMSB” is also a “truth is stranger than fiction” type of story that, if pitched to a studio, would be deemed as impossible to believe; hence, the word “miracle” in the title. My sole complaint (and it is minor) is the backing score which never seems to take a break.

You don’t have to be Catholic or a sports fan (or even an optimist) to appreciate everything contained within the frames of the film.

In this week leading up to Christmas, “AIMSB” (available on Amazon Prime) would make for a worthy alternative to the familiar holiday-themed titles in your library. Although it’s not about Christmas, it is uplifting, inspirational, and family-friendly, and will leave you feeling better about your fellow man, and maybe prove that there “ain’t no mountain high enough.”

This documentary would make for a worthy alternative to the familiar holiday-themed titles in your library. (Gravitas Ventures)

‘All In: Miracle at St. Bernard’s’
Documentary
Directors: Gregg Backer, Evan Kanew
Running Time: 1 hour, 36 minutes
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Release Date: Dec.16, 2022
Rating: 4.5 out of 5