Classic Movie Review: 'Semi Tough' is Proof Your Parents and Grandparents Were Just as Clueless As You

Semi Tough (1977)

Directed by Michael Ritchie

Written by Walter Bernstein, Ring Lardner

Starring Burt Reynolds, Kris Kristofferson, Jill Clayburgh

Release Date November 18th, 1977

Published February 7th, 2023

The classic on the latest edition of the Everyone's a Critic Movie Review Podcast was inspired by the release of the sort-of Football movie 80 for Brady. 1977's Semi Tough from director Michael Ritchie is also a sort-of Football movie. The film features football, it's about football players, but Football is very much not what interest's director Michael Ritchie. Rather, Football is a vague vehicle to be used to create a colorful setting for three colorful characters.

Semi Tough stars Burt Reynolds as Billy Clyde Puckett, a running back for the Miami Football team. It was 1977 and licensing actual football team names was not something that movie studios were particularly interested in doing. Billy Clyde is lucky to play alongside one of his two best friends, Wide Receiver Marvin 'Shake' Miller (Kris Kristofferson). Both Billy Clyde and Shake live with their other childhood best friend, Barbara Jane 'B.J' Bookman. She's also the daughter of the owner of the Miami Football team, played by Hollywood legend Robert 'The Music Man' Preston.

The plot, what plot there is of it, kicks in when B.J begins to have romantic feelings for Shake. This upends the friendly dynamic of the trio as Billy Clyde grows more and more jealous of his two friends. All the while, Miami is winning their way through the playoffs and on to the Super Bowl. And the movie could truly not care less about the football aspect. As I mentioned, Football is the culture in which these characters exist and Semi Tough is far more of a character piece than anything remotely like a sports movie.

The most memorable element of Semi Tough is a lengthy riff on self-help movements. If you're under the age of 30 you likely aren't aware of this but, your parents and grandparents who came of age in the 1970s briefly became obsessed with kooky self-help movements. EST for instance, the EST Movement, was a seminar in which a former Encyclopedia salesman berated people for endless hours per day, over several days, until people had emotional breakthroughs. That those breakthroughs came through the sheer force of inertia from being trapped in a hotel conference room for days while a salesman called you names was something we're not supposed to call attention to.

In Semi Tough, EST becomes BEAT, a very direct riff on EST, right down to Bert Convy's sleazy guru opening the meetings by calling his new students A##holes. From there, he tells them that if they have a problem, it's entirely their fault, they choose to have these problems and can choose not to have these problems. This nonsense apparently worked on Shakes who came out of his visit to BEAT a complete convert, a true believer. It does not work on B.J who finds the whole experience exhausting. This leads to a conflict between Shakes and B.J that may end their marriage plans.

Meanwhile, we watch as Billy Clyde attempts to drown his sorrows in a series of meaningless sexual encounters, one less satisfying than the next. One of these encounters provides a gag regarding Pyramid Power, a real self-help fad that had people placing pyramids around their homes, under their beds, and even wearing pyramids as hats. True believers were convinced by con artists that the reason Egyptian Pharaohs built the pyramids was because the shape brought good fortune. Thus, people started buying tacky, dime-store pyramids and making pyramid shapes, and wearing pyramid hats in hopes that they too would have good fortune.

I'm curious about something dear reader, does knowing that your parents and grandparents had no idea how to live bring you comfort or terrify you? That idea does reveal something about how you see the world doesn't it? The notion that these people we loved and trusted with our lives as children were being hoodwinked into wearing pyramids on their heads is a thought that either haunts you or brings you comfort. You can be haunted by the idea that life is all chance and survival within it is mostly random or you can be comforted that the people who raised you were just as clueless as you feel you are today.

That's a bit of a tangent but it was inspired by watching Semi Tough so I think it's a justifiable tangent. Semi Tough doesn't really hit the target in sending up these self-improvement movies but I am honestly not sure that Michael Ritchie was trying to land the jokes at the expense of these movements. I am not sure what drives Michael Ritchie's work. Ritchie is such a deeply unfocused and free-associating director that his interest in any scene is seemingly random. He seems to have a particular destination in mind but how we get there is something he seems to hope to discover as things play out.

If you find that kind of approach to filmmaking interesting, then Semi Tough might be for you. There is also the charm of Burt Reynolds and Jill Clayburgh that also might provide motivation for enjoying Semi Tough. That said, I don't think the movie is for me. I found it mostly meandering and unfocused when it isn't just irritatingly pointless. I can appreciate aspects of it and I like some of the places my mind went while I watched it, but I can't call it a satisfactory film watching experience.

Listen to me and my co-hosts Bob and Jeff, on the newest episode of the Everyone's a Critic Movie Review podcast which dropped online on February 6th. It's available anywhere where you listen to podcasts. We also talk about 80 for Brady, another sort-of Football movie that meanders through a meaningless plot far less experimentally. 80 for Brady is a mostly minor comedy where Semi Tough pretends toward being something more than just another comedy and comes up short.

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