Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1109 in DVD
• Released on: 2001-11-26
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 113 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Boaz Yakin's Remember the Titans boasts only one major star (Denzel Washington), but it does have an appealing cast of fresh unknowns and a winning emphasis on substance over self-indulgent style.

Set in Alexandria, Virginia in 1971, the fact-based story begins with the integration of black and white students at T C Williams High School. The effort to improve race relations is most keenly felt on the school's football team, the Titans, and bigoted tempers flare when a black head coach (Washington) is appointed and his victorious predecessor (Will Patton) reluctantly stays on as his assistant. It's affirmative action at its most volatile, complicated by the mandate that the coach will be fired if he loses a single game in the Titans' 13-game season.

The players represent a hotbed of racial tension, but as the team struggle towards unity and gridiron glory, Remember the Titans builds on several subplots and character dynamics to become an inspirational drama of Rocky-like proportions. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

On the DVD: Remember the Titans looks impressive in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen, with Dolby Digital 5.1 or DTS 5.1 sound options equally up to the "big game" challenge. Extras include a "making of" feature, hosted by Lynn Swann, which will seem a tad on the sentimental side for non-American audiences; but to balance the schmaltz there are two more interesting behind-the-scenes featurettes: "Denzel Becomes Boone" and "Beating the Odds". The commentary is standard, relatively uninspired stuff, with director Boaz Yakin, producer Jerry Bruckheimer and writer Gregory Allen Howard giving the low-down on the production. Even with the addition of a couple of deleted scenes and the theatrical trailer there isn’t really anything to get DVD aficionados drooling here. --Kristen Bowditch

DVD Description
DVD Special Features
Audio commentaries
Featurettes:
An inspirational journey behind the scenes
Denzel becomes Boone
Beating the odds
Deleted scenes
Theatrical trailer
Languages: Dolby Digital 5.1: English
Subtitles: English; English for the hearing impaired; Swedish; Norwegian; Danish; Finnish; Icelandic; Estonian
Running time: 109 mins approx.

Synopsis
While on the surface, American high school football may seem like an innocent game played by the young, for the young, it is, in fact, much, much more. For millions, including many fans who are well removed from their high school years but who love to sit in those creaky bleachers every Friday night or Saturday morning, it is something akin to a religion. Director Boaz Yakin's REMEMBER THE TITANS captures the heart of the sport while tackling the sins of its fathers, chronicling the true story of the undefeated 1971 T.C. Williams team of Alexandria, Virginia, which was the first integrated high school team in the state.
Denzel Washington brings his ever-powerful presence to the role of coach Herman Boone, who is brought in to oversee the transition to integration. Though Boone is eventually successful as a coach, the townspeople dissaprove of him because he replaces the popular, entrenched former coach, Bill Yoast (Will Patton). At first, coach Yoast resents being supplanted, while coach Boone is told that his promotion was just for show--to help the integration--and that he's likely to be lifted if the team loses a game. Will the coaches and players be able to overcome their adversity and make T.C. Williams a beacon for integration in sports

Customer Reviews

Simply Fantastic
The Story: In 1971 the T.C. Williams High School is desegregated and Herman Boone Played by Denzel Washington is hired as the Head Coach of the football team in place of the previous coach Bill Yoast played by Bill Patton. This replacing causes an outrage as the white kids refuse to play for a black coach. In order to get the white and black students to play together Boone hires Yoast as his defensive coach and takes the kids to camp to give them a tough lesson in brotherhood. After hard work and being pushed by the coach to get to know each other and see past the colour of each others skin the Titans are born and on entering the season they become an unstoppable team.

The Review: Simply the story telling, the inspirational acting and the fact that this is based on a true story makes this film a masterpiece and something truly memorable. As a person who takes an interest in the race relations of the mid 60s and 70s America, this is an educational film that shows me these decades weren't all full of racial hatred. Denzel, once again takes on a convincing role as Coach Boone. Washington embraces roles from this era and he showed us once again why he is considered one of the greatest African American actors of all time. Ryan Hurst who plays Gerry Bertier, and who in my opinion is a very underrated actor gave an exceptional performance when displaying the young white kid full of hate who then learned the error of his ways to become best friends with Julius Campbell his Black athletic equal.

A very good movie which I would highly recommend to the masses.

Red blooded sports film
This film tells the story of a mixed race American football team from a recently racially desegregated Southern US high school.

The film show cases the awkwardness of the coaching staff, with the successful white coach now finding himself the junior coach to a black team coach with his own conflicting ideas of what makes a team successful. As well as the coaches' friction, there is friction between the team members, who initially polarise on racial lines, and the teams performance duly collapses. However, following a soulful training retreat, the team members begin to befriend each other, the coaches work more closely and the team performance rockets.

The film has some very strong points. The characters all develop at a nice pace, with some genuinely strong performances from the young team members. There is a particularly touching scene where one of the players is paralysed in hospital. The actual sport side is relatively light, and for the British viewer, mercifully few technical American football remarks. The film does have one or two weaknesses, biggest being the at times rather melodramatic stand offs between the coaching staff, as well as the rather crude racist remarks and gestures, some of which even by the standards of the day seem over the top.

All in all the film is very uplifting, and a red blooded sports fan will find it especially enjoyable. Watch out for a young Hayden Panetierre, who was very young when this film was made and who stars as one coaches' daughter. Needless to say she has changed quite a bit since!

A good film.
Film based on a true story about a high school football team at a newly integrated high school in Virginia, America in the early 70s where black and white kids are able to play football together for the first time, and the struggles of their coach (played by Denzel Washington) to overcome the prejudices of his white and black football players towards one another as well as prejudices in the wider community. Usually when I see `based on a true story' at the start of a film I think `uh-oh' but this film thankfully did not pander to the clichés often found in such films and delivered a satisfactory moral tale - tempered with tragedy - that was not overly sentimental, as well as a satisfying ending to boot. Denzel Washington is as ever excellent as the coach standing up to not just white but also black prejudice and it is also good to see Hayden Panettiere - as Denzel Washington's assistant coach's young daughter - in a pre-Heroes role. A good film.