Full disclosure--I am from Abilene, and I think I have a pretty good eye for movies.
This film will not win any academy awards, but it is a good story that needed to be told.
The events in the movie are very close to true events and the lives the athletes led. They even took out some of the more sensational true events that were not as relevant to the plot.
I saw a rough cut of this movie when it was still called Brother's Keeper. From there, they re-edited the movie extensively, definitely for the better. If this was a Marvel movie, they would have done reshoots once they saw what they had in editing. Unfortunately, that was not feasible with this movie and budget. Just a few days of reshoots and pickups would have made a big difference. Seeing the evolution of the movie, I can tell what they wanted to do, but they just didn't have the tape. Hence, you are left with some plot holes, actual game tape that looks like it was filmed on VHS, and some other things I would have done differently. BTW, I say all this without ever having talked to anyone involved in directing or editing the movie, but it is pretty clear to me.
With the bad out of the way, I am really proud of Chad Mitchell and the stories he told. A lot of the kids were from very troubled backgrounds, and they had to be each other's family, because they had really bad home lives. They truly came together in a "Remember the Titans" way. That is not added to the story artificially.
They did a good job with shooting the big game. Again, it was mostly true to the real game, except the final score was a little more lopsided.
Milo Gibson did a good job, and Lawrence Fishburne did a great job. Fishburne played local BBQ legend Harold, and yes, he would randomly burst into song, whether in the kitchen or in the dining room. You can find it pretty easily on YouTube. Unfortunately, Fishburne was so magnetic, it kind of highlighted the lack of acting chops on some of the kids.
So, if you like football, Texas, high school kids overcoming obstacles, or all the above, I think you will enjoy this movie. As I said, it is a story that needs to be told.
