Review of The Replacements (2000) by Adam F — 11 May 2014

"The Replacements" has a cliché-ridden plot, cartoonish characters an obvious outcome but still manages to be entertaining and funny. The film begins with washed up football quarterback Shane Falco (Keanu Reeves) unearthing a football trophy that reminds him of his glory days and informs the audience that he's going to be the underdog we'll be cheering for. Falco could've been a star but he blew it on his last college game and his career went straight down the toilet. If you know your sports movies, you know there might be some hope for him yet. Turns out the over-paid athletes for the Washington Sentinels are going on strike over some salary disputes. The owner of the team decides to give one last shot to Jimmy McGinty (Gene Hackman), the Sentinels' former coach. He's hired to win three out of the four last games in order to advance the striking team to the playoffs and to do this he's free to find his own team of replacements. Here's where we get the ragtag team of players with nothing to lose and everything to gain, backed up with the coach that does things HIS way! But do these guys stand a chance at the glory? They're not like those other players, they're amateurs! What about Falco, sure he's got his eyes on the lead cheerleader but she "Doesn't date football players, especially not quarterbacks" so there's no hope there, right?

So granted, the film follows the same misfit-sports-team formula you've seen over and over from "The Mighty Ducks" to "Dodgeball" and "Remember the Titans". Sometimes it gets so hammy you can even predict what the speeches are going to sound like and for that reason I can't tell you that this is a great movie. That's not to say it's not enjoyable though. When the entire cheerleading team gets replaced by strippers who manage to help the team score a few points by being overly distracting, there's some funny stuff there. It's also amusing to see a bunch of rich football players get put in their place by a bunch of nobodies who have a lot whole more heart than they do. It's often ridiculous, feels very contrived more than once but it stays entertaining all the way through. Like every good sports movie, it makes you care about the game's outcome and the players on the field so it more than accomplishes its goals. As love plots go, this one isn't half bad either. If you are a fan of underdog sports movies, you'll enjoy it but if you're looking for something that's reinventing the wheel, you should probably look elsewhere. (Theatrical version on VHS, October 16, 2013).