Wolff rating: NOT BAD
Plot summary: High school football player intending on going to the Ivy League finds himself alienated and drawn to the football-obsessed life of a little Texas town.
Biased, pithy comments: I'm really torn about this movie. I quite enjoyed watching it, and even as I was checking off football movie/American male coming-of-age cliches, I actually wasn't sure which direction the movie would go. The relationship between Mox and his girlfriend, Mox and Lance, Billy Bob's head injury, and the classic sadistic coach (played with some restraint by Jon Voight, except when his script forced him to chew scenery); all of these cliches were picked up, lovingly used, and then put down in a slightly different orientation so you could see them in a new light. The acting was solid, if generally unremarkable, and the storytelling seemed to be going quite nicely. As such, I liked it until the end of the movie, which ended so abruptly my neck was sore and I had a bruise above my left eye. Apparently not only could I not figure out how this mess was going to end, neither could the flimmakers and their MTV-financed focus groups, and so it just trails off in a voice-over that tells you how things resolved without rewarding us with showing it. I'm sure the editing room was awash in sweat and nibbled fingernails as they tried to massage this into something that both ended on a high note and got the pacing right, but instead it made me feel unhappy. (Most disturbing is the spontaneous healing of one of the injuries that occurs, even after it was plot important that this character have some serious danger to his health; obviously, he had a better ending that they cut for time or pace.) This was an immensely popular film that made young MTV studios a hit, so obviously your mileage may vary, but I couldn't get over my disappointment at the end.
Other Notes: Just about every pro reviewer came away with my sense of solid storytelling gone awry with a goofy ending. Young high school football fans thought it spoke to them like nothing else.
How many times I have seen it: x1
Starring: James Van Der Beek, Amy Smart, Jon Voight, Paul Walker, Ron Lester, Scott Caan, Richard Lineback.
Directed by: Brian Robbins