Python Hyena Varsity Blues (1999): Dir: Brian Robbins / Cast: James Van Der Beek, Jon Voight, Paul Walker, Ron Lester, Scott Caan: Sports comedy with screwball elements yet takes its theme seriously. It regards a football team that has lost its star quarterback to a leg injury and how James Van Der Beek steps in becoming their star player. His parents jerk him in several directions. His relationship with his girlfriend is in pearl. His best friend's girlfriend presents herself with whipped cream covering her vital areas. Sounds like he has his dating life well in hand. Coach Bud threatens to terminate his scholarship. Despite its familiar grounds this film is a must for football fans. Huge improvement for director Brian Robbins who previously made an embarrassing ham handed mess called Good Burger. Van Der Beek is effective as he attempts to figure out where his life is headed. Jon Voight steal scenes as Bud whom Van Der Beek confronts regarding particular conduct that moves the team ahead. Paul Walker plays the injured quarterback whom Van Der Beek replaces. Ron Lester brings comic relief as Van Der Beek's friend who ended up with more concussions than needed. Another comic performance is from the wild antics of Scott Caan that are this side of breaking the law. Great combination of football action combined with screwball comedy and a strong theme regarding the illegal operations to succeed. Score: 8 / 10

david-sarkies In America we have laws to make this country run, in the town of West Canaan we have a law all of our own. This is how the movie Varsity Blues begins. It instantly lets you know that the town of West Canaan is somewhat different and it runs by a different set of rules. These rules are the rules of footballs and the players in the Coyotes are gods.Varisty Blues shows us a town where football fever has become a religion and the football oval is the temple to their god, but their gods change frequently: for when the star player becomes severely injured, he vanishes to be replaced by another hero, and this time a reluctant one. What we see in Varsity Blues is a religion that exists - but the movie forces it out. Every football season here in Adelaide everybody goes Crow fanatic (the Crows are one of Adelaide's two football teams).The thing with football here is that there is a lot of hypocrisy - when the team is on a loosing streak everybody hates them and have even booed them off of the field, while when they are on a winning streak, everybody dresses up in red, yellow, and blue, and goes hysterical over them. When confronted with this they claim that they followed the Crows through thick and thin - though we know that this is not true. What I don't like about football is that people will literally throw their responsibilities away when a game is on.Back to Varsity Blues - this movie emphasises the hypocrisy that surrounds football. The religious aspect is brought out with Mox's younger brother who is really deeply religious. He creates his own cult and his father's reply is "I don't want to see any more of this - you are going to play football like your brother." Parents fight over who's son is the better football player, and all of them had the same coach - who literally runs the town.Mox is an interesting fellow because he loves football, but detests the way the town idolises it. He states that what he is watching is a corruption of a good thing. He is more interested in a college degree in something that he likes, but his brilliant throw is forcing him to play football and to go down a career path that he does not want to go down. Moreso the coach is forcing the players to play until they are useless. He does not care about his team-member's health: he is more interested in winning. Unfortunately for the players, they are becoming crippled and being placed in very complicated and expensive surgery - and once they are gone then they have fallen from grace: this is clearly seen when Lance destroys his knee and his girlfriend leaves him for Mox.Varsity Blues is a bit of a slutty movie, but it addresses a very important issue in our society - the way we idolise a sport and place mere mortals upon a pedestal, only to throw them away when they are no longer needed. I agree with Mox - sport is fun and enjoyable, but it becomes corrupted when people start treating it like a religion.

Wuchak Released in 1999, "Varsity Blues" is a sports film about football in Central Texas, where high school football is virtually a religion. I was surprised at how engrossing and entertaining "Varsity Blues" is, much more so than similar films, like "Remember the Titans" (2000), "Woodlawn" (2015) and scores of others.The story revolves around a second-string quarterback, Mox (James Van Der Beek), who doesn't take football too seriously because he's consigned to the bench, but when the team's star-quarterback is seriously injured (Paul Walker), Mox rises to the challenge and begins to experience all the perks that come with being the football hero of the town.I'm not a huge fan of sports film, unless they successfully tap into other genres. "Varsity Blues" does this and is part high school dramedy. The movie features everything you'd want in a film of this ilk -- the sexpot cheerleader (Ali Larter), wild schoolmates (Scott Caan, Ron Lester), the smart girl (Amy Smart, no pun intended), wild parties, miscellaneous coming-of-age antics, megalomaniac coach (Jon Voight) and everything that goes with intense sports competition.Some people complain that the film's unrealistic because of all the extreme things that occur, but the team in "Varsity Blues" represents the typical champion high school football team and therefore they experience the various crazy things these types of teams encounter in real life. It was the same thing with "Platoon." Veterans of Vietnam say no one platoon would undergo all that this platoon experienced, but the group is a microcosm of all platoons throughout the Vietnam war. Also, movies like "Varsity Blues" and "Platoon" may come across as "too much" because filmmakers only have about 2 hours to tell the story and they have to jam a whole year of experiences into that time frame.Others complain about the lack of assistant coaches in the second half of the final game, but we'll have to assume that they went with a certain person and the film just doesn't show it. I rate "Varsity Blues" as high as I do because it's a stand-out sports film and high school dramedy that heavily influenced the more reality-based (but IMO less compelling) "Friday Night Lights," which came out five years later. No genre is beyond redemption or above contempt.The film runs 106 minutes and was shot in the Austin, TX, area (Georgetown, Elgin and Taylor). DIRECTOR: Brian Robbins. WRITER: W. Peter Iliff. GRADE: A-

wes-connors In the football-worshiping town of West Canaan, Texas, bench-warming James Van Der Beek (as Jonathan "Mox" Moxon) gets his chance to score when handsome blond quarterback Paul Walker (as Lance Harbor) is sidelined by injury. Hefty Ron Lester (as Billy Bob) and his pet pig "Bacon" give the film weighty fun. Horny Scott Caan (as Charlie Tweeder) adds latent homosexual laughs. Kept back in high school, the lads are pushed to the limit by loud-mouthed coach Jon Voight (as Bud Kilmer). There are plenty of shirt-shedding cheerleader types, hot for football muscle - especially luscious Ali Larter (as Darcy Sears) in a whipped cream bikini.*** Varsity Blues (1/15/99) Brian Robbins ~ James Van Der Beek, Jon Voight, Paul Walker, Ron Lester