He Got Game
Denzel Washington plays a man who is serving time in Attica for murdering his wife (it was an accident). The warden calls him in and says the governor is a huge fan of Big State. Washington's son is the number one high school player in the country. If Washington can get him to play for Big State, the governor will cut his sentence down.
That's laid out in the first few minutes of the film and it's a good hook. It's better when we come to understand that the son (NBA star Ray Allen, who is pretty good) hates his father. If I were Washington I might have told him not to go to Big State. But he and the son have many meetings and hash things out. leading to a final game of one-on-one.
Lee really stacks the deck here, and over-directs like a fiend. He uses Aaron Copland's music to tell us how American basketball is (it is, but has never really been America's pastime). The opening credits are shown over nostalgic pictures of all sorts of people playing, as if Lee was doing a Rick Burns about the sport (actually, that wouldn't be a bad idea, Spike). As with movies about baseball, this is a movie about a father and son, who communicate via basketball.
But there is just too much here. The movie is too long, and could have done without a subplot involving a prostitute Washington befriends (played by Milla Jovovich). Washington, as always, is great, and he seems to save his best stuff for Lee, but there's something missing here. I just couldn't figure out what made Washington's character tick, what drove him to drive his son so mercilessly.
A number of college coaches and other basketball personalities made cameos, including the now departed Dean Smith (and Roy Williams while he was at Kansas). I wonder if they were happy with the film, since it showcases the sordid behavior that goes on when a player is recruited, including throwing women at them.
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