Plot: What’s it about?
I have to admit that I have always been a bit questionable of “The Rock”, but after seeing “Gridiron Gang” that perception may have been altered. I had no idea that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was an All-American football player at the University of Miami and would probably be playing in the NFL right now had he not suffered a back injury that essentially ended his NFL hopes. Ok, true, he did play in the CFL for a little while before leaving that to pursue a career in, yes, professional wrestling. Now I won’t get into my hatred for professional wrestling here and maybe it is a good launching pad for a burgeoning actor like “The Rock”. Whatever the case, “The Rock” has made the literal leap from wrestler to actor and has some real talent as an actor as well. Factor all of this in and his previous films like “The Rundown”, “Doom”, “The Mummy” and “The Scorpion King” and he’s got a checkered history of hits and misses, though it’s hard to deny the appeal of this guy. Is he the new Ah-nuld? Who knows, but like him or hate him “The Rock” is most likely here to stay.
“Gridiron Gang” is the true life story of Sean Porter (The Rock), a frustrated probation officer in Los Angeles who’s sick and tired of seeing the troubled youths leave his facility only to go out and commit another crime or end up dead days/months/years later. So he decides to do something about it. He, of course, fights the system to get a football team started and tries to get every high school in the Los Angeles area to play the team. However when playing a team with convicted murderers, it’s hard to find a high school coach that will say “Sure”. However Porter does manage to make this happen and is now faced with the responsibility of taking these misfits and forming them into a collective winning team. There’s the standard set backs, of course, some of the members are on rival gangs and as Porter continues to give his all, he wonders if it’s all in vein. Yes, the movie is a bit sappy and predictable at times but it’s all in good fun and any fan of football will most likely want to give it a viewing.
Video: How does it look?
The 2.35:1 MPEG-2 HD transfer looks pretty good here, I didn’t notice any artifacting in the least and though a few of the scenes seemed to be a bit on the soft side, it didn’t detract from the viewing experience here. The movie has a very gritty look and feel to it (it kind of has to with a name like “Gridiron Gang”) and the various hues and tones in some of the key scenes tend to reflect that. Of all the Blu-ray films I’ve seen on the format, this ranks right up there with the best of them.
Audio: How does it sound?
I chose the uncompressed PCM 5.1 soundtrack which really brought out the best in the movie and my speakers. Football movies always sound really great in surround sound as the cracking of the pads and the thump of the people against the ground really does sound amazing. It’s all done for effect, of course, as watching a real football game doesn’t even compare to how Hollywood can make it sound. Dialogue is warm and rich as well and the soundtrack blares throughout the film giving it more of an ambiance. The standard Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack is also on the disc as is one in French.
Supplements: What are the extras?
The Blu-ray disc contains a sampling of supplements initiated by the audio commentary by director Phil Joanou. Joanou is proud of his work here and gives a fairly insightful commentary. He comments on the subject matter (of course), the shoot and working with a true to life story. Next up are 15 deleted scenes, available with director commentary or without. A trio of featurettes are also included starting off with “Gridiron Gang Football Training” which shows us the rigors of the shoot and how many takes the actors had to do to get it just right. They equated it to playing two actual football games in one day. Next up is a profile on the director, Phil Joanou and his interest in the script, how he worked with Sean Porter to bring it to the screen and a brief montage of some scenes from the movie. Lastly, we have “The Rock takes the Field” in which we see him talk about his old glory days at the University of Miami. Lastly, I’m not sure if Sony is trying to resurrect the oft-used “Multi Angle” function but its here nonetheless. We get a few scenes from the football game viewed in several different angles or you can put them all on one screen and see them at the same time. It’s a cool feature, though it didn’t really catch on with standard DVD so I doubt we’ll see much more of it this time around.
