Leatherheads

In 1925, an aging pro-football player (George Clooney, also directing) hopes to save his floundering team by signing a college star (John Krasinski), meanwhile sparring with a spunky female reporter (Renée Zellweger) who has her sights on the star for different reasons. Probably only Clooney could expect to get away with a movie this bad; he hogs the camera until his very real charm curdles into preening. The story is an unconvincing tale of early pro football (oddly so, since writers Duncan Brantley and Rick Reilly once worked for Sports Illustrated), morphing into an even less convincing story of a phony World War I hero. There’s an amusing opening shot involving a cow, then the movie immediately sputters and flames out. The repartee is limp, the slapstick leaden; even the football scenes are dull.