Real b-ballers get MTV twist

Similar to last year's "Friday Night Lights" and to a much more legendary extent "Hoosiers," "Coach Carter" is based on real life events surrounding a high school sports team and its new coach who turns around the team's losing past. However, unlike its predecessors, this film has obvious MTV overtones (MTV handled production), most notably the fact that Ashanti stars in the lead female role. \nSamuel L. Jackson gives another badass yet refined and polite performance as former Richmond High School basketball standout Ken Carter, who is offered the opportunity to coach his alma mater. Carter accepts and quickly turns around a team that only won four games the previous season with his Bob Knight-esque disciplinary techniques. After kicking a player off of his team for taking a swing at him, Carter makes him do 2,500 pushups and 1,000 suicides in three days to rejoin the team. Carter's freshman son soon joins the team after transferring from a highly rated prep school because of the respect he has for his father's coaching ability. \nThe team's winning streak quickly changes the players. They start to talk trash to opponents, sneak out of their hotel to get drunk with rich valley girls and skip classes. Their lack of academic focus upsets Carter above all else because he wants nothing more than for his boys to have a true shot at attending college, so he cancels all practices and games until the players' grades improve. By this point the parents have gotten involved and they try to oust the coach so their kids can maintain their undefeated record. If you have ever seen a sports movie you can guess where this buildup of drama will conclude. \nWhile Jackson's Carter is easily the highlight of this film, the players are able to hold their own. Rob Brown, who starred alongside Sean Connery in "Finding Forrester," gives a strong performance, as does Rick Gonzalez (who was in "The Rookie" among others) as gun-toting tough guy Timo Cruz. \nEssentially, this is your basic, run-of-the-mill, feel-good basketball flick. It has a little edge thanks to Samuel L., but quality-wise it is more on par with "Blue Chips" than "Hoosiers"