Remember the Titans (2000)
Directed by Boaz Yakin
After leading his football team to 15 winning seasons, coach Bill Yoast is demoted and replaced by Herman Boone – tough, opinionated and as different from the beloved Yoast as he could be. The two men learn to overcome their differences and turn a group of hostile young men into champions.
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What critics say influenced Remember the Titans
As said, it is inescapably formulaic, and somewhat simplistic in its idealism, but it's a long way from "Never on Sunday"'s self absorption.
Simply put, it is the best sports film since 1993's "Rudy."
Patton, who seems to have been cast as heavies ever since "Desperately Seeking Susan," seizes the opportunity to play a man whose comfortable world is jolted by societal change and he's sensational in the role.
Amazing how Patton has been a bad guy or a crazy guy (or a poorly written guy) in so many films ("The Postman," "Armageddon"), and I wasn't sure what his character would be like in the film.
These are intermixed with the action-packed, testosterone-charged stylings of uber-producer Jerry Bruckheimer (Con Air, Enemy of the State, Armageddon), so that the film alternates between scenes of physically devastating football violence (as in the slow motion collisions shown in the championship game) and devastatingly bad dramatic moments.
Overlooking a decidedly unnecessary wraparound sequence set in 1981, ten years after the central action, "Remember the Titans" is a motion picture that, for the first time in several years, producer Jerry Bruckheimer (1998's "Armageddon," 2000's "Coyote Ugly") can be proud of.
The movie comes from uber-producer Jerry Bruckheimer, whose last non-action outing was the ill conceived Coyote Ugly (he was also behind this summer's Gone In 60 Seconds, as well as past blockbusters like Armageddon and Crimson Tide).
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As Gerry's caring, but prejudiced girlfriend, Kate Bosworth (1998's "The Horse Whisperer") makes a minor impression with her few touching scenes in the second half, and Hayden Panettiere (1999's "Message in a Bottle"), as Assistant Coach Yoast's determined and precocious 9-year-old daughter, Cheryl, who narrates the picture as an adult, is appropriately precocious, delicately balancing her childish innocence with a wise-beyond-her-years dedication to her father's profession.
The material here won't make anyone forget Do the Right Thing, but it clearly doesn't want to.
Ryan Hurst (1998's "Saving Private Ryan") is an absolute standout as head white captain Gerry Bertier, while his nemesis-turned-close-friend Julius Campbell is, likewise, well-played by Wood Harris (2000's "Committed").
There are a number of fine young actors in the roles of team members, highlighted by Ryan Hurst of "Saving Private Ryan" who plays team captain Gerry Bertier.
But within the confines of a terribly predictable narrative, director Boaz Yakin (who made the extraordinary "Fresh" back in 1994 and then stumbled with 1998's "A Price Above Rubies") does a decent enough job of maintaining interest and building dramatic tension without getting overly mawkish about things.
The gradual thawing of suspicions on both sides holds few surprises, but the confidence of the football sequences is perhaps unexpected in Boaz (Fresh) Yakin's first studio picture.
But director Boaz Yakin ("Fresh," "A Price Above Rubies") uses that predictability as a strength.
But within the confines of a terribly predictable narrative, director Boaz Yakin (who made the extraordinary "Fresh" back in 1994 and then stumbled with 1998's "A Price Above Rubies") does a decent enough job of maintaining interest and building dramatic tension without getting overly mawkish about things.
The gradual thawing of suspicions on both sides holds few surprises, but the confidence of the football sequences is perhaps unexpected in Boaz (Fresh) Yakin's first studio picture.
The action on the field is convincingly staged (no "Any Given Sunday"-style operatics here) and Yakin, who directed the underappreciated "Fresh" and "A Price Above Rubies," finds a nice balance between the gridiron drama and the subplots about tensions in the community, in the school and even in the coaches' offices.
But director Boaz Yakin ("Fresh," "A Price Above Rubies") uses that predictability as a strength.
(CNN) -- Director Boaz Yakin, whose last movie was a uniquely provocative study of self-determinism called "A Price Above Rubies" (1998), has now graduated to a far more expensive Disney picture titled "Remember the Titans."
But within the confines of a terribly predictable narrative, director Boaz Yakin (who made the extraordinary "Fresh" back in 1994 and then stumbled with 1998's "A Price Above Rubies") does a decent enough job of maintaining interest and building dramatic tension without getting overly mawkish about things.
Written by sitcom refugee Gregory Allen Howard (not a computer after all) and lazily directed by Boaz Yakin ("A Price Above Rubies"), "Remember the Titans" has producer Jerry Bruckheimer's fingerprints all over it.
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As Gerry's caring, but prejudiced girlfriend, Kate Bosworth (1998's "The Horse Whisperer") makes a minor impression with her few touching scenes in the second half, and Hayden Panettiere (1999's "Message in a Bottle"), as Assistant Coach Yoast's determined and precocious 9-year-old daughter, Cheryl, who narrates the picture as an adult, is appropriately precocious, delicately balancing her childish innocence with a wise-beyond-her-years dedication to her father's profession.