Just one time...

Rating: 7/10 (17 August 2000)

The underdog sports genre, ah, how you have been so loyal...and exploited. The same formula over and over again, a group of misfits, outcasts, and that one has been veteran. Thrown in with an unconventional coach with rough edges who has heart in this team, which is currently a joke. Of course, the team starts to play like one and turn some heads, "maybe these guys ain't so bad", they often say.
Well don't expect director Howard Deutch to steer Vince McKewin's script based on the 1987 pro football player's strike. "The Replacements" follows every cliche in the book but still manages to please that demanding audience...stop laughing. Keanu Reeves pulls all of his acting talents out of the bag for this football comedy, ok I am sorry I couldn't finish writing that sentence without laughing.
Anywho, Reeves stars as Shane Falco, a quarterback with the cannon but always chokes when the big game is on the line. Falco now cleans barnacles off the bottoms of boats. Everyone doubts Coach McGinty (Gene Hackman) with his choice of QB but yee have little faith. McGinty was hired by the Washington Sentinels teamowner (Jack Warden) to throw together a team of replacement players, hence the title, to finish off the rest of the season because the pros want more dough and are at the picket lines. Well you know where it goes from here, the team has to win that almost impossible amount of games to make it to the playoffs to prove their talent isn't a fluke.
Though it sounds like I am tearing "The Replacements" a new one, I actually had a lot of fun watching it. It's a hilarious sports comedy with those zany characters and one incredibly attractive cheerleader, Falco's love interest Annabelle, played by Brooke Langton.
Thanks Keanu for tapping those infamous comedy roots, dude.
All in all, everything "The Waterboy" should be and claims to be but way more.
8.5/10