The main plot of the movie involves reporter Lexie's attempt to uncover the truth of Carter's military past, using her feminine wiles to get close to the star, all the while maintaining a contentious and flirtatious relationship with the older Dodge. And most of it is uninteresting and lacking spark, while rehashing Bull Durham-type bits without any of the sensuality and power of Susan Sarandon.

This disinteresting main plot often loses its way to a bunch of more disconnected scenes of what football and life was like in the roaring twenties. The result is a mashed up series of vignettes that are often amusing, but not cohesive enough to bond the movie together. Worse, the mix of slapstick humour in the football bits with the romantic bits of the main plot, or the intended emotional impact of the resolution, don't fit together. There are tone shift problems throughout the film that are almost as bad as the lack of chemistry between Clooney and Zellweger (or Krasinski and Zellweger). I'd have preferred if they just stuck to the slapstick tone, and dumped the drama altogether. Clooney proves himself adept at comedy here as he did previously with O Brother, Where Art Thou?, providing the movie with its best parts by being unafraid to be the butt of several jokes.

Unfortunately, neither Clooney's nor Krasinski's comedic chops are enough to make Leatherheads any more than a breezy comedy that, while not a complete failure, is certainly a mild disappointment.