Finally a movie about high school sports that isn't a clichÃ©

Rating: Null/10 (20 February 2005)

The thought that I had the most when I was watching this movie is,"this is way better than Varsity Blues." I actually identified with these characters, mainly, because they are actual people with real life problems. The characters from Varsity Blues are your stereotypical teen comedy characters. You have your fat guy. You have your somewhat sensitive hero guy that has one problem that keeps him from succeeding, which is he doesn't want to go the same school his daddy went to. I can't even remember anyone else from that movie because you could replace them with anybody from any teen movie ever made. And of course, the ending tied everything up to where everyone was happy.
Friday Night Lights is different. It deals with the pressure that these real kids went through to perform perfectly. They have pressure from their coach, their families, each other, and the whole town. This town of Odessa, Texas lives for this team.
In most of the characters in this film, I could see parts of someone I knew from my own high school. There are great guys on this team, and there are jerks. There are heroes and there are disappointments. Everything about this movie has a sense of reality to it that no other football movie has touched.
There is something in the book that was hinted at near the beginning of the film but never really explored, that I wish were in the film. When they are eating in the diner and they get their food for free, it is because they are football players. What the movie doesn't say is that many of these guys were given that same treatment with their grades so they could stay eligible to play. I don't know if that would have been too many issues for this film to deal with, but I think it would have put an interesting spin on it.
One of the other things I loved about this movie is the score. It was written and recorded by a band called Explosions in the Sky, and they are an amazing instrumental rock group. Instead of the pop that most teen movies are filled with, these songs seem to be telling the story with sound, as most good scores do, but in a totally fresh and dynamic fashion.
Overall I would have to give this movie an 8 out of 10. Although the ending isn't a traditional Hollywood happy ending, there were a few scenes at the end that I felt didn't fit in with the rest of the film. I highly recommend this movie to anyone.