The trailers for this year's British Open suggested that we would be treated to a feature presentation of "Young Guns," starring Rory McIlroy and a posse of other young gunslingers who were remaking the world in their own image.
Instead, we got "Now, Voyager," with Darren Clarke as the character looking to cast aside years of unrequited yearnings.
This was perhaps the Ulsterman's last, best hope of a winning a major championship and in the end it was he, and not any of his younger contemporaries, who drank from the Claret Jug.
There once was a time when Clarke was considered the best player not to have won a major. But he'd fallen so far in recent years that he seemed out of the running for even that most dubious of honors. In fact, he qualified for this year's Open only by dint of finishing in the top 30 on last year's European Tour earnings list.
Clarke thrived in the topsy-turvy weather that treated the players to varying degrees of wind and rain. He kept his ball trajectory low, as he learned during his formative years in Portrush, and was able to avoid the big mistake that plagued most everyone else.
Steady play won this championship. There was, however, brilliance afoot in the persons of Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson, who between them have authored some of the most gruesome collapses in major championship golf over the last decade. Their presence near the top of the leaderboard must have been a salve for Clarke.
Mickelson began Sunday as if he'd alit from a different planet. In the previous three rounds, the only hole on the front nine he'd so much as birdied was the seventh. But now, he was clipping strokes off par at the second, fourth and sixth. And he holed an outrageous putt at the seventh for eagle to gain a share of the lead with Clarke.
But Lefty's demons came out of the bag at 11, where he botched a tap-in. By this time, Clarke had recorded his own eagle at the seventh, thanks to his draining a putt from 25 feet, to regain a 2-stroke advantage. Mickelson went without a birdie the rest of the way, coming home via Winged Foot, including an approach shot at 16 that landed in the greenside grandstand.
Johnson, meanwhile, hung around and was only two strokes behind Clarke when he knocked his tee shot out of bounds at 14 to effectively finish him off. Clarke left the 14th green up by four strokes and cruised home from there without a care in the world, despite dropped shots at 17 and 18.
Clarke, who opened with rounds of 68, 68 and 69, shot a closing 70 for a 3-stroke victory, with Johnson and Mickelson sharing second place.
"I got a couple of good breaks that went my way," Clarke said. "[Saturday,] I played as good as I could play from tee to green and I didn't really get anything out of it. Today I played not bad, I played okay. Got a couple of good breaks that went my way. Also, at the same time, hit lots of great putts today which burnt the edges and didn't go in. So it sort of balanced out.
"I actually did not take anything for granted until it was on the back edge of the 18th green there. It was just one of those things where I was trying to be sensible."
Clarke admitted that the desert in which he's been wandering the past several years has made for a difficult journey.
"You know, bad times in golf are more frequent than the good times," Clarke said. "I've always been pretty hard on myself when I fail because I don't find it very easy to accept that. And there's times I've been completely and utterly fed up with the game. But friends and family and Chubby [manager Chandler] say, 'Get out there and practice and keep going, keep going, keep going,' and that's why I'm sitting here now."
Much has been made about the heartache Clarke has experienced with the loss of his wife Heather to breast cancer in 2006 and he touched on that, as well.
"There's obviously somebody who is watching down from up above there, and I know she'd be very proud of me," Clarke said. "She'd probably be saying, 'I told you so.' But I think she'd be more proud of my two boys, and them at home watching, more than anything else. It's been a long journey to get here. As I say, I'm 42 and I'm not getting any younger. But you know, I've got here in the end."
Clarke admitted that before the season started, he sat down and set two goals for himself for this year - to win a couple tournaments (check - he also won at Iberdrola) and to get back to Augusta for the Masters (check - his Open title earns him a trip there next April). So what's left now?
"To win another couple of these," Clarke said. "You know, what can I do? Can I say that's it, I'm going to retire now? I've got to keep on playing. To be the Open champion is just incredible. I've got to go back now, reassess and set some more goals. I don't just want to rest on this."
What the links and the weather giveth Clarke, it taketh where McIlroy was concerned. The U.S. Open champ settled for a share of 25th place at 7-over-par 287 (71-69-74-73), which was 12 strokes off Clarke's winning number. While never out of striking range over the first 36 holes, he never drew into contention and seemed out of his comfort zone at Royal St. George's.
"I'm not a fan of golf tournaments that the outcome is predicted so much by the weather," McIlroy said. "It's not my sort of golf. But that's the Open Championship, and that's the way some years go. These conditions I just don't enjoy playing in really. That's the bottom line. I'd rather play when it's 80 degrees and sunny and not much wind."
The wind came into play at the seventh hole on Sunday, where McIlroy's birdie opportunity was scuttled when his ball moved on the green.
"You're looking at an 8-foot birdie putt and then, all of a sudden, it's for par, and then you're a bit scrambled, and you miss it and end up making bogey," McIlroy said.
Graeme McDowell and Padraig Harrington didn't make it to the weekend. McDowell, as has been typical this year, opened in fine fashion, matching Clarke at 68 to stand three strokes off Thomas Bjorn, the first-round leader. But he didn't wait for the weekend to self-destruct. That happened on Friday, when he struggled to finish with 77 and miss the cut by two strokes.
"I just can't string four rounds together at the minute, and this week I couldn't even string two together," McDowell said. "Just throwing shots away, simple shots around the greens. I really didn't hit the golf ball terribly the last couple days, I just scored horrible.
"I wouldn't call it traumatic, it's just sport. But it's disappointing, of course. I'm just not in the right frame of mind right now. My technique is all there, everything is all there. There's just something going on. Maybe my expectation level is putting a little too much pressure on myself."
Harrington, a 2-time winner of this event, shot rounds of 73 and 71 to miss by one stroke.
