he pre-Depression era newspaper comedy "Leatherheads," George Clooney's third and most accessible directing job, is a larky throwback to the breakneck screwballs of Frank Capra and Preston Sturges. And while it's not as good as the 20's era classics, curiously enough, it's just as fun, using the Rat Pack-y cast of The Philadelphia Story – that being Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn, and James Stewart - as the influence for the main cast.

That'd be Clooney, Renee Zellweger and John Krasinski. Working the project as director, Clooney has given himself the key role - Dodge Connolly - an aging star and guiding light of the Duluth Bulldogs. "Leatherheads" delivers raucous sports shenanigans and tasty period flavour.

Leatherheads is set during the early days of pro football circa 1925, the same year Harold Lloyd made his classic The Freshman, and college football was all the rage but the professional league was an aloof operation considered unfit for grown men. The entire professional football league was in a state of collapse. Clooney's Connelly is a charming yet brash player, and is convinced that he can save the league. In order to do this, he entices college star Carter The Bullet Rutherford (John Krasinski) — or to be accurate, his manager CC Frazier (Jonathan Pryce) — to play for the Bulldogs. He is not only a football hero, but a World War I hero, having captured an entire German regiment single-handedly.

Meanwhile, ambitious gal reporter Lexie Littleton (Zelleweger) is following their team in the hopes of bringing down the reputation of the new star player. She thinks the football champ is too good to be true. Aiming to prove her case, the spitfire goes to the big leagues and digs deeper into Carter's background. Both Connelly and Rutherford take a shine to Lexie, but she's got her own agenda: to expose Carter's battlefield heroics as a outright sham.

Taken from a long-in-development script by Sports Illustrated writers Duncan Brantley and Rick Reilly, "Leatherheads'' has its lapses in logic. Most of the period detail shines, but Randy Newman’s score often steals the thunder of the old-timey cuteness.

The Roaring ‘20s costumes, sets and music all look great, while cinematographer Newton Thomas Sigel gives the South Carolina location a well-lit footage a wash of amber to warm the pic. But Leatherheads never quite feels right. No contemporary film can match the greatness of Frank Capra classics - many aspects are stolen from The Front Page and It Happened One Night. Nonetheless, when the main cast is together on screen, you can feel the magic.