Trailer
Plot summary
In 1976, parts of Philadelphia are protesting the shutdown of job sites, and the city's NFL team, the Eagles, keeps losing. Vince Papale, thirty years old, teaches part time and tends bar at night, and his wife Sharon has lost patience with his failure to support the family. The school lays him off. At the bar he sees a report that the Eagles have hired a new head coach, Dick Vermeil, and opened tryouts to the public, and the regulars, die-hard Eagles fans, tell him to go. He comes home to find Sharon gone, leaving only a note. He meets a new co-worker, Janet Cantrell, who supports the rival New York Giants. Short of income and urged on by his friends, Vince attends the tryout at Veterans Stadium.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Invincible (2006)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
SPOILER
The fumble recovery in the climactic scene did occur, but Papale's touchdown did not count under NFL rules at the time, since the ball could not be advanced; Papale never scored a regular-season touchdown in the NFL, and his only offensive stat was one catch for 15 yards in 1977.- Mark Wahlberg was shorter, at 5'8", than Vince Papale, who stood at 6'2" while playing for the Eagles; Wahlberg was closer to Papale's high-school height of 5'7".
- The film inspired a third-season episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia called "The Gang Gets Invincible", in which Dennis, Mac and Dee try out for the Philadelphia Eagles, repeatedly calling it "that New Kids on the Block movie" and seemingly confusing Mark Wahlberg with his brother Donnie.
- The opening scene features the Eagles' 31-0 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals on December 7, 1975, with a fan commenting that the Eagles lost to a team worse than they were; in 1975 the Bengals actually went 11-3 and were the wild card team in the AFC.
- Before the Eagles, Papale played with the semi-pro Aston Green Knights of the Seaboard Football League and two seasons with the Philadelphia Bell of the World Football League, one of the NFL's rival leagues on the level of the AFL and the USFL, and was a standout special teams star.
- Vince Papale's first wife did leave him, leaving a similar note to the one in the film, but that happened in 1971, five years before the events of the movie.
