Rama’s SCREEN

THE LONGSHOTS does its job of being an inspirational movie for the young generation today but as far as movie quality goes it’s a long shot from even gettin’ near to the level of better inspirational films out there. At times, it feels like it’s cliche and stealing many of the concepts and themes done in other sports movies but with… the only difference is having this one character that’s like the first female in all boys league. But as I’ve said before, THE LONGSHOTS will definitely work on the youth today and make them think twice before they hide their talents away.

A heartwarming story of the the first and only girl quarterback in Pop Warner football history. Curtis Plummer (Ice Cube) - a down-on-his-luck former high school football star - turns his niece, Jasmine (Keke Palmer from “Akeelah & The Bee”), into the quarterback of the local team, the Minden Browns, and gets his stride back when he becomes the team coach. With Curtis as their new leader and their pigtail-wearing star player, this team of misfits wins its way to the the Pop Warner Super Bowl and the small city of Minden, Illinois, is ignited with team spirit, town pride and the glory it once knew.

This is actually Ice Cube’s decent flick in a while. The dude’s an okay actor but his choices haven’t been tight, yo! (First Sunday, Are We Done Yet?, XXX: State of The Union)
His role in this movie as a grumpy, bitter uncle who re-discovers the fire in his life again is clearly the work of a person who’s got the potential of sharpening his skills with each upcoming decent project, hopefully.
There are moments in this movie, where I see Ice Cube and I can see how he would fit perfectly the role of B.A. Baracus should he get cast in The A-Team movie.

I gotta give some props to Fred Durst as the director. Who would’ve thought the foul mouthed former Limp Bizkit’s front man got the filmmaking stuff in him all along?! It’s proof that the themes of the movie that you can do just about anything you put your mind to goes the same in real life and applies to the guy behind the camera.
His directing is very subtle, you can tell that it’s very basic, the scenes and the shots he took give me the impression that Fred Durst knows enough to pull this off.
And how ’bout that Keke Palmer, huh?! The girl who plays the star of the movie. You gotta admire her dedication and her convincing performance. The word is she trained for 7 weeks with a professional quarterback preparing for her role in this movie. It paid off, she’s a promising talented young actress with a bright future ahead of her.

Sometimes I’d get annoyed by movies that lack necessary build up but I gotta remind myself that this is a simple family movie, anything more would be too hard for the youngsters to digest.
I wish they’d elaborate more on the team, but maybe because then it would lose the whole purpose, which in this case, it tries to remind us that the concept of winning could be much deeper and more profound than just a having a trophy.
The writers probably could’ve tweaked the dialogue a bit so that they won’t sound something that out of a soap opera or any TV drama. At times, there’d be lines that mean well and want to inspire but I chuckle instead.

THE LONGSHOTS may not be Rudy but it’s got heart and good lessons that I think the whole family can enjoy.

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