You all have got twitter to blame for this review.  I vaguely remember Coach Carter playing in theaters back in 2005 but I didn’t see it.  To be honest, the only thing that bores me more than high school football is high school basketball.  I have to admit that I really can’t stand to watch basketball, largely because I hate the way the player’s shoes are always squeaking on the court.  It just hurts my ears.

But, I’ve noticed that whenever Coach Carter shows up on television, everyone on my twitter timeline seems to get excited about it.  Coach Carter is one of those films that is obviously popular with a lot of people so, when I saw that it was going to be playing on Showtime last week, I figured why not?

And you know what?

Coach Carter is actually a pretty good movie.  If I don’t seem overly enthusiastic about it, that’s because I’m just not into sports.  But I do love movies and Coach Carter is an effective film.  That it’s predictable isn’t really that much of a surprise.  Predictability is actually probably one of the main appeals of the sports genre.  But Coach Carter is distinguished by a strong cast and it has a pretty good message to boot.

Plus, it’s based on a true story!  How true I don’t know but I’d like to think that the movie stuck pretty close to the facts if just because the story is so appealing.

Anyway, the Coach Carter of the title is played by Samuel L. Jackson.  At the start of the film, Carter takes over as basketball coach at the same inner city high school that he graduated from.  When he first starts, his team is rude, disrespectful, and undisciplined.  The majority of them have little direction in their lives and have basically pinned whatever hope they have for the future on eventually playing professional basketball.

(I will admit right now that I was really excited to discover that Channing Tatum played one of the players.  The only thing that would have made me happier would have been for James Franco to suddenly show up.)

Carter informs his team that, in order to play for him, they have to be willing sign a contract that states that they will treat everyone respectfully, that they will wear a tie on game days, and that they will all maintain a C+ average.  Some of the players refuse to sign (and are promptly kicked off the team) but those who do quickly discover that Carter expects them to honor the terms of the contract.

And, under Carter’s leadership, the team goes on to have a great season.  They’ve got an undefeated record and appear to be heading for the play-offs when Carter discovers that several members of the team have failed to keep up their grades.  To the shock of both the faculty and the community, Carter benches his entire team and announces that none of them will play until all of them have at least a 2.3 GPA.

Needless to say, it all leads to one of those emotional school board meetings that always seems to show up in films like this.

As I stated above, it’s all fairly predictable but the movie itself is well-made.  And if anyone was born to play an outspoken basketball coach who isn’t going to let anyone tell him how to run his team, it’s Samuel L. Jackson.  Jackson is one of those actors who is so good and so powerful that I think we sometimes tend to take him for granted.  Perhaps the best thing about Coach Carter is that it gives Jackson a chance to show what he’s truly capable of doing as an actor.

Again, I really don’t know that much about basketball and I’m not a fan of the game.  But, with all that in mind, I was still entertained by Coach Carter.  If nothing else, it proved that a lot of the people on my twitter timeline aren’t crazy.