Kurt Warner’s improbable journey is told in the movie American Underdog, which also makes a few unexpected alterations. Warner is followed throughout the entire movie, from his phenomenal senior year of college at the University of Northern Iowa to his first NFL game as the St. Louis Rams’ starting quarterback. Warner is portrayed by Zachary Levi, and Brenda, Warner’s frank and supporting wife, is portrayed by Anna Paquin.
The film American Underdog, which was directed by brothers Jon and Andrew Erwin and focuses on faith-based stories, demonstrates how Warner worked to realise his dream of being a professional football player. Warner followed a unique path to the NFL; he was not selected by any team in the NFL draught and didn’t get his first significant professional opportunity until five years after earning his undergraduate degree. His time playing in the Arena Football League before receiving a tryout with the Rams is portrayed in the film.
American Underdog largely adheres to Warner’s story’s key plot developments. A few details were left out to make the plot tighter; the major adjustment was made to give the movie’s climax more dramatic weight. This is not the first time a sports film has modified a factual story; Friday Night Lights also made some alterations. Here are the changes made by the Erwin brothers in order to adapt Warner’s adventure for the big screen.
Coaching at the University of Northern Iowa
Warner hired an agent in the hopes of being selected by the NFL, but no team signed him after his final season at UNI. Warner obtained a job restocking the shelves at the midwestern supermarket chain Hy-Vee to support Brenda and her children after trying out unsuccessfully for the Green Bay Packers. Hy-Vee was not, however, Warner’s only position after graduating.
During the overnight shift, Warner was in charge of restocking. He worked as an assistant coach during the day for the University of Northern Iowa football team, which he had previously played for. Warner worked hard to stay in the starting lineup for Coach Terry Allen (played by Adam Baldwin, who also stars in Firefly), but American Underdog ignores his post-graduation relationship with the institution. It makes fitting that the movie follows suit with the real-life Warner, who places more focus on the time he spent stocking grocery store shelves between college and his NFL career.
Warner’s Time With the Barnstormers
Warner’s pre-NFL revenue source is left out, and American Underdog is ambiguous about how much time he spent playing in the Arena Football League. Warner and his family struggled to make ends meet while working two jobs, so he chose to accept a position as a football player for the Iowa Barnstormers. When Warner was seeking for a chance to play football in the late 1990s, the AFL was relatively well-liked despite having less prestige than the NFL.
The film American Underdog doesn’t mention how long Warner was a member of the Des Moines squad; instead, it focuses on the difficulties that working remotely brought for his relationship with Brenda (a difficult choice that Lara Jean also had to make in the previous To All the Boys movie). Between the 1995–1997 season, Warner started at quarterback for the Barnstormers. Warner earned a tryout with the Chicago Bears prior to the 1997 AFL season, but this is also left out in the film. Warner apparently missed the tryout because he was unable to attend due to a spider bite.
Again, these are minor adjustments; mentioning Warner’s unsuccessful tryout with the Packers earlier in American Underdog may have made mentioning his Bears tryout seem a little redundant. The primary goal of showcasing Warner’s time with the Barnstormers in the AFL was to demonstrate how he handled the disappointment of not being able to enter the NFL right out of college. Similar to Denis Villenueve’s choice to exclude a key sequence from Dune, the directors made a creative choice to trim the timeline in order to keep the tale flowing.
The Beginning of Warner’s NFL Career
Kurt Warner’s NFL debut is a further omission from American Underdog’s Kurt Warner story that helps the narrative progress. In the film, Warner goes to the St. Louis Rams for a tryout, makes the club, and eventually is named the starting quarterback. Warner was transferred to play for the Amsterdam Admirals in the NFL Europe before joining the Rams officially.
After putting up a strong performance in Europe, where he led the league in passing yards and touchdowns, Warner returned to play as the Rams’ third-string quarterback in the fall of 1998. Due to his underwhelming first season with the Rams, he was selected as an unprotected player available for transfer to the Cleveland Browns in the 1999 NFL Expansion Draft. Although it all appears quite dramatic, it would have significantly lengthened American Underdog’s almost two-hour running time.
Kurt Warner finally had his chance to play in the NFL after years of perseverance and hard work when Coach Dick Vermeil (Dennis Quaid, who nearly played Alan Grant in Jurassic Park) selected him as the starter for the 1999 campaign. American Underdog leaves out the fact that Warner only saw a little playing time in 1998 in order to add drama. Instead, they highlight the Rams’ season opener in 1999 versus the Ravens as his NFL debut. Warner turns up the heat and rallies his squad to victory after a shaky beginning. The movie concludes with this game, but football enthusiasts will know that it was only the start of a fantastic season for the Rams, who are known as “The Greatest Show On Turf.” American Underdog depicts Warner’s incredible year, which included leading his team to the Super Bowl, through a montage of authentic NFL footage from the 1999–2000 season.
Warner’s Post-NFL Career
American Underdog includes some post-scripts regarding Warner’s life following the 2000 Super Bowl during the clip montage. They talk about his further Super Bowl appearances in 2001 and 2009, as well as his successful marriage to Brenda, which produced five more kids. Despite the fact that Warner has continued to be quite prominent in football broadcasting, nothing is known about his post-NFL career. Warner returned to his roots by working as a broadcaster for the Iowa Barnstormers after leaving the NFL in 2010.
He also began working as an analyst for the NFL Network and contributes frequently to NFL Total Access. Outside of the football world, he has been on television a few times, including as himself in The Suite Life On Deck (whose actors, Dylan and Cole Sprouse, have moved on to better things) and as a participant on Dancing With the Stars. The hardest struggles Warner had while pursuing an unusual goal are highlighted in the film. The trials that weren’t included are quite comparable to those that are already in the film, keeping the repetition to a minimum. It is challenging to convey everything that happened in Warner’s life after the 1999 season opener because of the way the climax is set up. The story’s alterations and omissions are excusable given American Underdog’s overall plot.
