I can't say it enough, I love football and I love football movies. I've rarely seen a bad football movie. If I were to make a list of my favorite football movies "Remember the Titans" would be at the top, closely followed by "Friday Night Lights."
RTT differs from most sports movies in that we weren't dealing with a plucky group of guys who had no business being on the field, but miraculously come together and win. These guys were good, but could they get along long enough to play together as a team?
The year was 1971 and Alexandria, Virginia's TC Williams High School was formed as a combination of the city's segregated White and Black high schools. Like many southern cities, Alexandria was very resistant to the 1954 Brown v. Topeka Board of Education decision that made segregated schools illegal. They waited seventeen years to integrate and I'm sure it was not by choice. Part of their new restructuring was to give a head coaching position to a Black head coach. They chose Coach Herman Boone (played by Denzel Washington) to bump Coach Bill Yoast (Will Patton). There was already going to be tension for the forced integration, so what more when an accomplished head coach is being bumped out of his position?
Two better coaches couldn't have been chosen. I don't mean that they were the best X's and O's men in the game, I mean that their personalities were uniquely suited for the situation they were put in. Coach Boone was strong willed, bullheaded, and good at coaching. He'd have to be all of that to command the respect of his coaches and his players. Coach Yoast was selfless, agreeable, and integritous enough to not sabotage Coach Boone as he could have.
RTT started with the team's training camp preseason where Coach Boone wanted to not only make them good players, but he wanted to make them a team. I couldn't appreciate this starting point more. Many sports movies start somewhere midseason and have a team make this phenomenal turn around. RTT showed all the hard work that goes into making a good team well before they play a single game. Coach Boone pushed those guys to the brink and he was indiscriminate in his demands. He was trying to make a winning team. As he said, even if they didn't love each other, they were going to respect each other.
The two alpha males on the team and the bitterest about the whole situation were Julius Campbell (Wood Harris) and Gerry Bertier (Ryan Hurst). If they could get along, then just maybe the rest of the team would follow suit.
It was no walk in the park and things didn't just fall into place. There was years of history acting as a dutiful guard of the old order. There was unbridled hostility and an entire community wanting to keep things status quo. RTT doesn't shy away from the hurt, the pain, the anger, and the ignorance--and I think it's a better movie for it. They could've glossed right over the painful parts of the past and celebrated a victorious team, but the movie showed that past and how a community, a school, and a team got past it.
RTT is more than a football movie. Sure, the football team was the focus, but it was the vehicle for showing a greater lesson. It was about sacrifice, about learning from mistakes, learning from each other, and loving one another. Ultimately, it was about transcending differences and coming together, and all the good that can result from togetherness.
RTT differs from most sports movies in that we weren't dealing with a plucky group of guys who had no business being on the field, but miraculously come together and win. These guys were good, but could they get along long enough to play together as a team?
The year was 1971 and Alexandria, Virginia's TC Williams High School was formed as a combination of the city's segregated White and Black high schools. Like many southern cities, Alexandria was very resistant to the 1954 Brown v. Topeka Board of Education decision that made segregated schools illegal. They waited seventeen years to integrate and I'm sure it was not by choice. Part of their new restructuring was to give a head coaching position to a Black head coach. They chose Coach Herman Boone (played by Denzel Washington) to bump Coach Bill Yoast (Will Patton). There was already going to be tension for the forced integration, so what more when an accomplished head coach is being bumped out of his position?
Two better coaches couldn't have been chosen. I don't mean that they were the best X's and O's men in the game, I mean that their personalities were uniquely suited for the situation they were put in. Coach Boone was strong willed, bullheaded, and good at coaching. He'd have to be all of that to command the respect of his coaches and his players. Coach Yoast was selfless, agreeable, and integritous enough to not sabotage Coach Boone as he could have.
RTT started with the team's training camp preseason where Coach Boone wanted to not only make them good players, but he wanted to make them a team. I couldn't appreciate this starting point more. Many sports movies start somewhere midseason and have a team make this phenomenal turn around. RTT showed all the hard work that goes into making a good team well before they play a single game. Coach Boone pushed those guys to the brink and he was indiscriminate in his demands. He was trying to make a winning team. As he said, even if they didn't love each other, they were going to respect each other.
The two alpha males on the team and the bitterest about the whole situation were Julius Campbell (Wood Harris) and Gerry Bertier (Ryan Hurst). If they could get along, then just maybe the rest of the team would follow suit.
It was no walk in the park and things didn't just fall into place. There was years of history acting as a dutiful guard of the old order. There was unbridled hostility and an entire community wanting to keep things status quo. RTT doesn't shy away from the hurt, the pain, the anger, and the ignorance--and I think it's a better movie for it. They could've glossed right over the painful parts of the past and celebrated a victorious team, but the movie showed that past and how a community, a school, and a team got past it.
RTT is more than a football movie. Sure, the football team was the focus, but it was the vehicle for showing a greater lesson. It was about sacrifice, about learning from mistakes, learning from each other, and loving one another. Ultimately, it was about transcending differences and coming together, and all the good that can result from togetherness.