filmcritic . com presents a review from staff member bradley null you can find the review with full credits at <a href= " http : //filmcritic . com/misc/emporium . nsf/2a460f93626cd4678625624c007f2b46/4273eccb750e44ab882569680006d5fc ? opendocument " >http : //filmcritic . com/misc/emporium . nsf/2a460f93626cd4678625624c007f2b46/4273eccb750e44ab882569680006d5fc ? opendocument</a> here's the pitch : take an emotional drama about the racial conflict concerning the integration of a black high school and a white one in the south . then wrap the entire plot around a hard-nosed high school football coach ( washington ) with an unorthodox style but an uncanny ability to get the most out of his players . as an added little twist in this case , the old white head coach ( patton ) stays on as an assistant so we can play with a fair amount of racial conflict and power struggle as these two egos collide , and ultimately generate a little more emotion as they become friends . the last bit aside , we've all seen this movie a couple of times before , so we know what to expect from the feel-good sentiment . to be sure , a lot of bigoted white folks are going to do a lot of mean things until they slowly start to understand that we are all the same on the inside . and a bunch of jaded and underachieving high school athletes will slowly learn what it is their coach is trying to teach them about becoming men and champions . throw in the fat kid from the wrong side of the tracks who finds his inspiration and a little pride along the way , and we've got the most heartwarming film ever made . the only trouble with this concoction is that in trying to concurrently satisfy these two very demanding genres -- sports story and racial drama -- director boaz yakin and producers jerry bruckheimer and chad oman felt compelled to include the same stock scenes that we've seen before in both of these genres . the townspeople rise up against the outsider coach , the players who struggled under him at first come to respect him , the white man finally realizes that he and his black counterpart aren't that different , and of course , there's the ever-popular brick-through-the-window of the new black family in the neighborhood . of course , the filmmakers ride these powerful scenes for all of the emotion they've got . but ultimately , this continuous stringing along of genre conventions weighs the film down , preventing the filmmakers from bringing any really new elements to the table . remember the titans is based on a true story . and thankfully so . if it weren't for that fact , audiences probably wouldn't buy all of yakin and bruckheimer's string pulling . as it turns out , even though bruckheimer , the action producer with the touch of gold , would seem unqualified for this picture , these two manage to mine the emotional for it's worth . as it turns out , genre cliches turn out to be the most powerful elements of the film , alongside the force of nature that is denzel washington . in particular , the emotional scenes of the team coming together on the football field prove the most effective . ( if you don't know much about football , you can identify these scenes by the fact that they usually follow an impassioned speech by one or another player or coach , and are always backed by an emotional rock or r&b hit of the 60's or 70's . ) ironically , the occasions when the filmmakers aren't following genre conventions ( in the film's rare opportunities for originality ) are the times when the film tends to flounder the worst . most notably , the subplot about a sexually ambiguous surfer-boy from california is simply awkward and dilutes from tension at the heart of the story . also , the decision to bookend the film with a funeral sequence from ten years later is stupid and pointless . it was unnecessary and overbearing in films like titanic and saving private ryan , but here it is simply a waste of the audience's time and attention . you actually find yourself wondering who is going to die and how that will tie in to the plot , only to find out in the end that it doesn't tie in at all . all in all , the movie is very consistent if not overpowering . you've seen it all before , but the competent repackaging will manage to tug at your heart strings anyway . we're all suckers like that , i guess . and jerry bruckheimer knows it better than anyone . 
