The Senior (2025) * * *

Directed by:  Rod Lurie

Starring:  Michael Chiklis, Mary Stuart Masterson, Rob Corddry, Brandon Flynn, Todd Terry

The Senior is based on a true story of a 59-year-old former college football player named Mike Flynt (Chiklis) who learns he still has one year of college eligibility left and decides to try out for his old college football team in West Texas.  I recall there was a 1991 comedy called Necessary Roughness which covers the same ground, but the events of The Senior take place in 2007 and Flynt didn't realize the loophole until then.  I wonder if he visited the movie at some point later.  

Mike was a college superstar who was kicked out of college before his senior year due to repeatedly being involved in fights on campus.  We learn in flashbacks he was raised by a quasi-abusive father who taught him boxing by repeatedly punching his son in the face and insulting him into "being a man".  This made Mike quick to drop the gloves, so to speak, and engage in fistfights.  Years later, Mike is happily married, although with a resentful son Micah (Flynn) with whom Mike has a cold, distant relationship.  He works as a construction foreman with a loving, understanding wife Eileen (Masterson), and one day receives a reunion invitation of his old football team even though he never completed his collegiate career.

Mike reconciles with the teammate he fought back then and learns he still has another eligible year of college ball.  Mike decides to try out for the team not only as a lark, but as a way to remedy his belief that his life is somehow incomplete without football.  Coach Sam Weston (Corddry) thinks Mike wants a coaching job, and is somewhat relieved and amused that Mike wants to play football.  He figures Mike will be quickly cut, but then sees Mike is a determined individual who won't be dismissed easily.  Mike has his detractors, including a player who hits him with a cheap shot hard enough to keep him out of commission for most of the season.  Mike fights to come back, and soon finds he has the support and camaraderie of his teammates.  

The Senior doesn't break new ground.  It ends with a big game, and whether Mike will actually see playing time.   You would think The Senior is a retelling of Rudy, with one character actually referencing Rudy when describing Mike's tenacity, but it's a separate true story involving another man who won't quit and wants nothing more than to be a footnote in college football history.  Mike has no illusions about doing anything more with his career, and Chiklis is an embodiment of the pugnacious Flynt down to his bones.  The Senior also exudes care and reflection, with Mike learning that his father embraced faith later in life and maybe he should follow in his dad's footsteps to release his pent-up anger at his past.  We find ourselves rooting for Mike and that's why The Senior was made.  On that level, it is absorbing.