bkoganbing The Washington professional football team which is NOT named the Redskins for this film seems on the verge of a championship, but then the players in the NFL pull out and go on strike about two thirds of the season through. Naturally this does not sit well with the football public or the general sports public for that matter. No one can figure out why these well paid athletes want eight million as opposed to seven million. Owner Jack Warden who seems to be modeled on the legendary Redskins owner George Preston Marshall like his peers hires The Replacements to finish out the season. It's an interesting collection of has beens, and never wases that coach Gene Hackman has to work with. It calls for a different kind of coaching than one would normally expect, but somehow I think Vince Lombardi would approve of Hackman's methods.Chief recruit is Keanu Reeves a one time golden quarterback prospect who screwed up his own prospects, I'll not reveal how. But Reeves sees this as a shot to show what he could have done. As the most professional of this group Reeves is essential and he lets neither the team or the audience down. He also has head cheerleader Brooke Langton in his corner giving his morale a needed boost.This replacement Washington team develops a style of gonzo football like the Charleston Chiefs gonzo hockey in Slap Shot. It's what makes The Replacements the fine entertainment it is.I do have to say that I remember when baseball had a lock out and tried to negotiate with their players under a threat and did hire replacements in spring training. I still have memories of watching those spring training games with that set of replacements for the Mets in this case. I'll not forget Ralph Kiner and the rest of the Mets announcers just sounding in agony describing the game.Those replacement Mets just never got into the spirit of The Replacements.

Python Hyena The Replacements (2000): Dir: Howard Deutch / Cast: Keanu Reeves, Gene Hackman, Orlando Jones, Brooke Langton, Jon Favreau: Same old junk with a different paint job. It suggests ignorance on behalf of those whom the team will eventually prove wrong. Gene Hackman plays a football coach who decides to assemble a team of players who have dropped out of sight. There is a football strike and he views this as an opportunity for others to shed their light. Among these are a maniac cop, a convict, a gambler who can kick, two big black bar bouncers, a sumo wrestler, etc. Keanu Reeves is sought after as a quarterback. He served a nasty defeat but Hackman still sees potential. Recycled and dreary with director Howard Deutch doing his best but after making The Odd Couple 2 he needs all the help he can muster. He also directed Pretty in Pink and Some Kind of Wonderful (which doesn't describe this film). Hackman is wasted as the coach who will whip these players into shape. Orlando Jones is far too talented to be stuck in a film that requires no thought. Brooke Langton's role is obvious in that she is basically a romantic prop. While Varsity Blues made this same sort of film entertaining and funny, here is a film so deserving to be toss onto a football field so that it might be stumped on by every single player. The screenplay is in bad need of replacing. Score: 2 / 10

Filip Radojcic Pretty interesting story about second handed rugby team. BUT, most interesting fact is that team wasn't professional rugby players, but people who were in jail, just a normal people who work their job, like in good old days of amateur sport. Since first team got in strike, they had to somehow continue their championship. Like always, every beginning is hard, they had to meet each others better. They were always fighting and arguing about nothing, but when they met each others better, realize that they got lots of stuff in common, they started playing better and better. But they weren't normal rugby players, they were amateurs, people who work their job and play sport for fun, that is strange in sport of 21th century, isn't it ? Nowadays sport is all about money, there's no more joy or anything more, money, money, money. Well those people didn't care for money, they played for fun and they actually reached something. They reached play-off for their team. At the end they weren't been stalking by commericalist for signing contact for some sneakers or anything else, they just celebrated it and went to their home. They all reached some experience that they will remember for whole their life, that movie should be an example of how sport should be nowadays...The scene i liked the most is this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxe-5lJ6R6o&feature=endscreen. Whole team finished in jail and they decided to sing song called "I will survive". Probably the best scene in this movie...

Maniac-9 As far as football comedy movies go this is fairly high up on my list. It's most definitely a comedy but still had real moments for the characters with real issues to overcome. Not an exact match but I kind of view this as the football version of Major League. You can tell the characters have real chemistry together and could be actual teammates with how well they interact with each other. Really enjoyed hearing John Madden and Pat Summerall doing the commentary of the games, my favorite football announce team ever by the way.The story itself is your usual loser overcomes the odds sports movies but even with that I didn't care because of how funny the story was.