Emotionally shallow

Rating: 5/10 (20 January 2005)

I really cannot understand all of the fuss about this movie. I saw it last night and I found it emotionally shallow, very predictable, and, although Eastwood directs with great skill, and many other elements are deftly contrived, the characters are so clichéd that that I found myself getting quite bored, and I stayed uninvolved throughout.
The characterisations in particular were a joke - i,e, the forthright priest, the trailer trash family, and the scrawny kid in the Gym. Most of all the coach, played by Morgan Freeman was used in such a predictable way, and the 'villains' were so obvious, it was simply laughable. In short, what this film lacked was emotional honesty and some sense of reality. I would only rate this a 5/10.