It's the early 1900's in Savannah, Georgia. A young Rannulph Junuh (Matt Damon) is the hottest golfer to come out of the South in perhaps all time. He has it all: a great talent, loved by the people of Savannah, a beautiful love and probably future wife in Adele Invergordon (Charlize Theron, people back then didn't really have these names did they?). But then World War I intrudes and Rannulph heads off to Europe, leading the young men from Savannah in a grand adventure.

But a disastrous battle leaves Rannulph with a deep mental scar and he disappears. Over a decade later, Rannulph returns quietly, becoming a recluse. The Great Depression hits Savannah as badly as the rest of the US. Adele's father has just had a new golf course built but with no customers he faces financial ruin. Not able to face that prospect, Mr Invergordon commits suicide and Adele now has to fight off the bankers who want to buy out the golf course or foreclose.

Adele comes up with an exhibition golf tournament between the two best golfers in the country: Walter Hagen (Bruce McGill, who I'll always think of as Jack Dalton, MacGiver's pilot friend) and Bobby Jones (Joel Gretsch, who I don't remember seeing anywhere else before) with a $10000 prize to the winner. But the Savannah city council wants one of their own in the tournament, to uphold the honor of their fair city. Eventually they decide to ask Rannulph.

Although the estranged relationship between Rannulph and Adele would be enough to throw off Rannulph's game, Rannulph (usually referred to by his last name in the movie) has a bigger problem: he's lost his swing. After agreeing to represent Savannah, Junuh has his work cut out for him as he has to prepare after not golfing for over a decade. Practicing one night, he looks up to see a stranger approach. His name is Bagger Vance (Will Smith) and Bagger wants to be Rannulph's caddie (for $5 guaranteed, which he thinks is a better bet than the $1000 he would get as the caddie of the winning golfer).

So that's the setup of The Legend of Bagger Vance, a rather quiet film from Dreamworks SKG and directed by Robert Redford. Can Bagger, with his almost homespun quips and anecdotes, help Junuh come to grips with his personal demons? What about Junuh and Adele, is there a future for them both? And who's going to win the tournament? The only major character I left out is Hardy Greaves (J Michael Moncrief), a kid who really likes golf and looks up to Junuh as some sort of hero. The movie is told from the kid's point of view mostly, and he provides narration throughout.

This movie strolls along languidly through its two-hour-plus running time. The focus here is the golf tournament and Junuh's battle to overcome his demons and win the tournament. There is very little romance, quite a bit of exposition, some flashbacks from the Great War, and a lot of drama. It's a basic man against himself story. There are a lot of scenes from the golf tournament, which spans four days and 72 holes.

If you like golf this is a nice movie to watch. It makes golf dramatic and they include a bit of the strategy of golf. For example, grass follows the sun so putting early in the day is different than putting late in the day. There's not much of a romance so don't go to the movie looking for that. The movie is not as good as I thought it would be. I guess the previews made it out to be something different so I wasn't expecting what I got. But I did like the movie, not too sure how many other people would though.