I just got a bit of breaking news across my TV screen, it turns out the Vikings are more than Brett Favre. As it turns out, he’s not the only player on the team, in fact, the Vikings have a running back who is really, really good. This DVD takes you through Adrian Peterson’s first two years in the league.
The DVD starts with Adrian getting into his massive vehicle and driving to training camp while listening to Paul Allen talk about him on the radio. The DVD jumps around from practice to games to draft stuff, it’s not hard to follow, but hard to remember the order when writing a review.
The draft section goes though Adrian’s college career and the combine scouting process. And to remind people how Peterson fell to the 7th overall pick, they make sure to tell everyone how he was injured quite often in college. The actual draft isn’t filmed with much tension; they jump right to the seventh pick and the bald idiot talking to AP on the phone before the pick. They completely threw away the chance to screw with me some more. Seriously, if they would have went through all the picks and showed AP after each of them, I would still probably be worried when the Vikings were on the clock because I would still be afraid we we’re going to take Brady Quinn. That was one of the scariest days of my life, and I’m glad it worked out.
Speaking of working out, that’s another part of the documentary. Not weight lifting working out, but training camp working out. The bulk of the practice footage and time spent talking about practice revolves around Peterson and running back coach Eric Bieniemy having a bunch of little conflicts. Apparently they don’t always get along so well on the practice field, but both of them are professionals and don’t let it affect them. They both know they are trying to make Peterson the best he can be, so they can be fighting after one play and perfectly fine after the next play. And then they let the bald idiot with the huge beard talk for some reason. It always scares me to think he actually has anything to do with the coaching of Peterson or anyone else on the team for that matter.
Speaking of the rest of the team, there isn’t much mention of them through the feature. They talk about the line a little bit and they even mention a certain QB the Vikings now have even though he didn’t play on the team either of the two years the movie focuses on. But all things considered, they don’t spend too much time on him. I mean, if they made this same movie after this year, it would be nothing but Brett Favre passes to AP and wrangler commercials. I hate you Brett.
The bulk of the movie is game footage of AP destroying people. That is what most people want to see, and it’s the place that NFL Films shines its brightest. Thanks to exclusive video, audio, and soul rights, NFL Films can show a side of the game no one else can. It’s really a sweet gig for them. They obviously hit on all the big games from AP’s first two years. 260 yards against the Bears, 296 against the Chargers, 2 TDs in the Pro Bowl as a rookie. The audio also shows how Peterson has grown as a leader in his first two years. Year one he’s not very talkative in the pregame running back huddle and by year two he’s leading the huddle and getting everyone fired up.
The movie ends with AP leaving the practice facility with a gate rolling open and then back closed. It’s some shitty camera work at that time, but they didn’t have much choice I’m guessing. But holy cow I can do better than that. And no, that’s not just talk, I actually run a camera for the campus TV station at football games and for other news related stuff and I can do better than the last shot. But hey, no grudges, I might need a job one day.
All Day With Adrian Peterson is presented in Fullscreen format and Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound.
It’s NFL Films quality. What does that mean? Most of it is footage you haven’t seen before and most of it is Audio you’ve never heard before. Sometimes the live aspect of the filming means it gets shaky or you miss something, but it’s still top notch.
This is the first time I’ve ever wanted to give extra stars to the extra content. There are two extras on the DVD: the 2007 Minnesota Vikings season review from NFL Films and the 2008 Minnesota Vikings Review from NFL Films. The NFL Films season reviews are the greatest pieces of video ever put together. They make the Lions 0-16 season seem like they were two plays away from the winning every game. The fact that there are two Vikings seasons on here is reason enough for any Vikings fan to pick this up.
NFL Films is notorious for making kick ass football documentaries. This one is good, but not as in depth as I was expecting. There is some stuff from training camp and practices but not really enough for you to get the feeling you’re spending all day with Adrian Peterson. It’s good, but it could have been better. The extras save the DVD as a whole. Plus it gives me a chance to yell at the coach who shall not be named whenever they put him on screen.
