Not original in the slightest sense of the word, but good acting and entertaining comedy make this weak story at least a little bit better.

Rating: 6/10 (8 September 2000)

The Replacements, as I am sure hundreds of people have noted already, is yet another football movie. There have been only a few football movies which were very well made and resulted in quality films (Unnecessary Roughness was fairly well-done, and especially The Program, probably one of the best), but it seemed that The Replacements was an effort to either revive that genre (which is pretty much worn out) or to cash in on its past success. The story is loosely based on and an updated version of the 1987 pro-football strike (I doubt that the bullet riddled Porsche was a 1987 model), but the majority of the film is made up of an unimaginative story about "replacement players."
Almost the entire movie was put together using scenes that were disturbingly familiar to scenes from other films. For example, the actual replacement players were introduced exactly the same way that the 'replacement astronauts' were introduced in Armageddon. The actual football scenes require no imagination at all, and could have come from anywhere, and the cheerleaders were a tasteless element of the film in the tradition of BASEketball. Besides that, how about the ending? (spoilers) The team needs "heart" in order to win the big game, coach McGinty (Gene Hackman) says to the television reporter. He is obviously sending out a message specifically to Shane Falco (Keanu Reeves), the team's 'star' replacement quarterback. How touching. Needless to say, Falco decides to head down to the stadium to save the day, and boot the pro quarterback who had recently re-joined the team. Falco walks into the locker room at half time, everyone cheers, they go on to win the game. Does that sound familiar at all ("Remember when B-Bobby Boucher showed up and the M-M-Mud Dogs won the Bourbon Bowl, do ya?")? Yeah, so Falco saved the day in true Waterboy form, and the movie ends just like every other football film ever made has ended.

Despite the lacking story and the many unlikely events that take place ("Is that your ride?" "Yeah." BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM!!!), The Replacements was barely saved by some surprisingly good acting. I was sick and tired of Keanu Reeves (until I saw The Matrix, where he delivered an excellent performance), and I expected a disappointing turn from The Matrix to a routine football film, but he was very convincing as the disillusioned quarterback who is suddenly faced with the chance to reverse his shabby reputation. Even Brooke Langton provides a good depiction of the only original cheerleader who is suddenly surrounded by strip club airheads and has some pretty good on-screen chemistry with the monotonous Keanu. The Replacements is a fairly good football film which doesn't really do anything that hasn't been done before, but at least it wasn't as terrible as Varsity Blues. It is worth watching to see the underdogs beat the odds and come out on top (yet again), but don't expect any plot twists. If you've ever seen a sports movie, you know the basic structure that they follow, and you'll know what's going to happen from the very beginning.