Coach Carter Blu-ray Edition
Take a high school athletic super star turned local sporting goods store owner and a school basketball team struggling to win a single game and you may have a winning combination.
Film making 21/25
Cinematography 21/25
Audio 20/25
Bonus Features 20/25
Total 82/100
Ken Carter is a graduate of Richmond High School with plenty of athletic awards to back up his reputation who went on to graduate college and now owns a sporting goods store in the same community. Richmond High School struggles with inner city problems like gangs, drugs and violence with only half the students graduating much less sending many on to college.
One moment of the film that summarizes for me the troubles of these inner city schools is between Coach Carter and the schools principle. The principle says that for some of the high school basketball players participation on the team will be the highlight of their life.
The problems of not only students plagued with gang violence and drugs everywhere but teachers who have lost hope in their students futures are the heart of Coach Carter. Ken Carter tackles the problems of Richmond High School as well as the parents and faculty to bring a winning team as well as hope to the players and students.
Ken Carter is a local sporting goods store owner with a son on the St. Francis High School Basketball team, a rival of his alma mater Richmond high School. The high school is in desperate need of a coach that can do something for the team but gives them more than just teaching them how to play basketball.
Ken Carter agrees to help the team but on his terms, he asks the players to sign contracts to not only show up at practice and games on time but to do better at school. He thinks that half the problem with the school and their students is they do not have anything to look forward to beyond the high school years.
He gives examples of statistics like how many students will never graduate and how they will probably end up in jail or dead if they stay in the neighborhood. His belief of doing better at school and doing well on the court could lead to a college scholarship and a better life beyond the neighborhood.
He works the students mercilessly with exercises to get their stamina up but runs into a roadblock with other teachers. He wants teachers to give progress reports but with them swamped with work trying to get students to just pass their classes they leave his reports for later.
He gets the team to win some games through really hard work and just being a tough coach that they at first see as just harsh but soon see as a way to get them to come together as a team. His odd teaching style comes to a head when his students fail to achieve at least passing grades and lets down their coach as well as themselves.
The coach locks down the gym and cancels further games until the students get at least passing grades which throws the students, faculty and parents into an uproar. The team agrees with the coach, they have no choice but to do well in school in order to at least have a chance at some kind of college and better life for themselves. But their parents do not and want to have the coach fired so they can continue winning at basketball toward the championships.
Coach Carter is the real life story of how a sporting goods store owner with a talent for basketball works his magic on and off the court to not only influence the players toward a better game but a better life. His perseverance and headstrong attitude gives the team not only the motivation but the chance to make their dreams come true.
Samuel Jackson plays the coach who defies the school board and teaches the kids that basketball could be a way toward a better life if they work at it. The movie also has plenty of other good actors as well as a great soundtrack with a really good mix of music.
Samuel Jackson is great and many have said this is the performance of his lifetime, but other films more recent may change that. Coach Carter is a great film and an inspiration for anyone who has a dream and believes hard work can accomplish that dream.
The Blu-ray edition contains special features like the real life coach Ken Carter and how the film was made as well as the usual commentary and deleted scenes. There is also a music video Called Hope by Twista featuring Faith Evans and how they wrote the screenplay for the film that differs from the real life events.
While the film takes a few liberties with events and how the coach actually inspired and trained the team they did have the lockdown that forced the students to take a hard look at their own lives and the direction they were headed. Ken Carter in real life inspired his student athletes to work toward a goal that they themselves could only dream of and had little real hope of achieving.
The film’s final scene with the credits rolling has short clips of text about what happened to several of the students after their high school days. While many only ventured to college and made little in the way of a monumental career in basketball they did continue on to college on sports scholarships and earned a degree in something.
This lead many to lives much different than the ghetto of their birth and the real life dream come true of an honest living not in the drugs and crime of their past. Ken Carter touched many lives and his inspiration and guidance changed the lives of many of the students both on and off the court and ones who were not even on the team.