Customer Reviews

Blue Chips

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

"Blue Chips" is one of my favorite basketball movies. I've seen it a few times and it still doesn't get old. A coach (Nick Nolte) that has always had a successful career as coach of Western University is facing the threat of his first ever losing season. He has to find a way to get his team back on a winning streak, even if it means finding new and better players.

Nick Nolte does a spectacular job as the coach, but that's not the only reason that "Blue Chips" is such a realistic and great basketball movie. If you're familiar with NBA basketball, you'll see a lot of players that you know from today's game such as Penny Hardaway and Shaq. You'll also see other basketball legends such as Larry Bird and Bob Cousy. When it's gametime, it's as realistic as a movie can get. It has powerful coaching, spectacular defensive and offensive movies, the roaring crowd, and even the press conference after the game. "Blue Chips" has more drama in it than just about any basketball movie ever made.

If you'd like to see a realistic basketball movie, I recommend getting "Blue Chips." It won't let you down.

Nick Nolte plays an explosive, but caring college basketball coach who's career is on the decline due to recruiting problems. Nolte decides to lose his ethics and give recruits money, cars, houses, etc. to get them to come to his school. A serious sports movie without the usual fairytale ending. The basketball action is exciting and realistic because most of it is played by real NBA stars, like Shaq, Penny Hardaway, Allan Houston, George Lynch and many others. Bob Cousy is better than expected as the athletic director who doesn't miss foul shots.

We sure do make a lot of sports movies in the US, and this is one of the better ones, not as good as Hoosiers, but then again who could touch Gene Hackman in his prime, right? What I like about this one is the somewhat stiff performances by Shaq and Anfernee Hardaway, which add "something" of reality to the film. Really. The other good thing is Nick Nolte. He played his part to the hilt. He sold his soul to the devil (he cheated), but then he redeemed himself. The scene with him teaching the kids at the playground the fundamentals is a classy and classic ending. Excellent movie. It's not as emotionally exhilerating as Hoosiers, but that's another story, right?

Nick Nolte, age 53 here, is outstanding in his role as "Pete Bell" in 1994's "Blue Chips". Bell is a Bobby Knight-like basketball coach who is not at all happy when his team is on the losing end of the score. Knight himself has a role in this movie, as do some other well-known people from the real basketball world.

I find myself watching and re-watching the opening scene of this film, where Nolte storms into the locker room, wreaking havoc on the water cooler (and whatever else happens to be within arm's reach). It's a great beginning to a very good motion picture.

The DVD edition of "Blue Chips" was released by Paramount in March of 2005, and became a welcome addition to my collection of movie discs. The DVD offers up a beautiful-looking Widescreen (1.85:1 anamorphic) version of the movie. Colors are brilliant. No bonus features are offered on the disc however. Not even the Theatrical Trailer, which would have been kind of nice to have.

The 1997 VHS video edition of "Blue Chips" is not really too bad either, although it's not in the preferred Widescreen mode. But the VHS does offer a robust 2.0 Dolby Surround track.

If you collect sports movies, you should probably get yourself a video or DVD copy of 1994's "Blue Chips" for sure. It's worth the price for that opening water cooler-destroying scene and Coach Bell's later basketball-kicking tirade all by themselves. ;)

"I want this team to win so bad I can TASTE it!!"

Where does one begin when attempting to describe an artistic work of true genius? What did the first art critic say after seeing Leo¡¦s Mona Lisa?

Words cannot do justice to this celluloid epic brought to us by the mastermind who also brought to us Kevin Costner playing baseball in a movie.

Let us begin at the beginning. Just see the movie. Stop whatever you are doing right now, and go watch the movie. If you have already seen it, do yourself a favor and watch it again.

There, that was easy, was it not? Now, the role of the reviewer remains, so we must at least attempt to describe to others, those who have not experienced this work of cinematic excellence how exactly their lives are incomplete for not having experienced it.

Perhaps what stands out most amongst the incomprehensible joy that is this film is the brilliant cast of characters immortalized here in. Blue Chips gave us Nick Nolte in all of his post-48 Hours pre-mug shot glory, back when he was still believable as a human being. Nolte stars as Pete Bell, a generic Bob Knight in a Season on the Brink who eventually decides to cast his lot in with the Pete Carrolls and John Calliparis of the coaching world and start recruiting a little more creatively. But that is just a drop in the bucket of the fictional world this film encompasses.

It gave us Ricky Roe, the farmboy moron with the heart of gold (and a daddy who needs a new tractor). It gave us Neon Bordeaux; that born-on-the-bayou conglomeration of superhuman athletic prowess and a happy go-lucky attitude towards his own illiteracy that makes it a little bit easier to overlook the sad state of poor rural and/or inner city school systems in the United States. It gave us Butch McRae, a Magic Johnson 2.0 (minus the AIDS) whose single mother who could just use a little help to put some food on the table for Butch and his four sisters. And those are just the recruits.

Groundbreaking in its own right is the scene where Rick Pitino has to explain to his wife why he gave $3,000 to an assistant coaches¡¦ wife for an abortion after Rick impregnated her following 30 seconds of sex on a table at a friend¡¦s Italian Restaurant. Truly Oscar worthy in every sense of the term.

Also look for revelatory performances from Ed O¡¦Neil as a guy named Ed (not Al Bundy) and Bob Cousy as Vic the athletic director. If all of that was not enough to convince you that this is quite possibly the greatest film ever made, please allow me to introduce the following bullet list to further my case on behalf of the film¡¦s most eloquent contributions to the history of moving pictures:

« Bob Hurley as an Indiana Hoosier
« The awkward Eric Anderson/Calbert Chaney shower scene
« Dick Vitale eating pizza
« Jim Caviezel playing basketball (prior to Crucifixion)
« Jerry Tarkanian topless scene
« Larry Bird as a shady used car salesman

In conclusion, watch the movie. You will thank Matt Nover and I later. To put it simply, Da Vinci and Picasso are lucky that Ron Shelton did not want to be a painter.

P.S. I liked Kazaam too.

Being involved in collegiate and high school coaching, I tend to go back and watch this film from time to time to remind me of what sports is all about. If you're a coach, it's about your devotion to your program and to your kids that you coach. It's the job, it's the challenge. It's the same as teaching a class of Math or History to a bunch of kids. The point is to teach them to become better at what they do and to also make them better on everything outside of the game itself.

If you're a ballplayer, it's about your devotion to the game and to yourself and to your team. You're as good as your team and it is up to you to understand the philosophy being taught in the game. The game doesn't just teach you about becoming a better ball player. The game teaches you about leadership, teamwork, decision-making, and responsibility. Whether you succeed at the game or not, you succeed in all other aspects involved.

Blue Chips is about how critical it can become at times to make right decisions at all levels of athletics. Whether you're the president of the college, the athletic director, a booster, a coach, or even a player, the decisions you make can have considerable effects and consequences for the overall integrity of the sport, your school, and career. Without going into too much detail about the movie, Blue Chips deals with under the table financing of high school players by boosters and people close to the college, in hopes of wooing these standouts to sign with the program. All levels of the program are involved in this true-to-life tale of deception, greed, and moral judgment.

I will disagree with other reviewers about the cast. I will argue that to tell the true story of this side of collegiate athletics, it would be normal to use actual athletes that were "larger than life" at the time. Overall, a good movie to watch if you enjoy the sports genre.

Nick Nolte is Coach Pete Bell in This drama about basketball. He has been a failure the last two seasons. He starts to develop a straight A team. even going to Louisiana and finding the big man Shaquele O'Neal. He knows when he does this that he is going to need an incentive for them. Thats Where the Alumni Supporter crook Happy(J.T. Walsh) comes in to buy the players and give them what they want. Of course they can get passed the sportswriter(played by Ed O'Neill) who is working on the story fo Basketball corruption.
Director: William Friedkin
Screenplay: Ron Shelton

Thanks to Anfernee Hardaway and Shaquille O'Neal, this movie contains some of the absolute worst acting I have ever seen in my life. And yes, that includes the 50 or so "Mystery Science Theater" movies that I have viewed. Watching the two of them try to act was like watching two blue whales attempting to scale Mount Everest. See what I'm getting at here? Apparently, the producers figured that getting real athletes to pass as actors would be better than getting real actors to pass as athletes. WRONG!!! Personally, I would rather see these two try & sing opera next time rather than do another stint in a movie. [By the way, if they are in any more movies, I categorically refuse to see them].

Somehow, this is still a great movie. Nick Nolte turns in a superb and convincing performance of a intense, once successful college basketball coach who is desperate to have a competitive team. The seemingly hopeless plight of his less-than-talented team leads him to "bend the rules" with the efficacy of catapulting his roster back to the summit of NCAA athletics.

This movie serves as a trenchant satire of what has become of modern college athletics. Bribery & special gifts to student athletes becomes a way for Nolte's university to entice the very best talent on the market. This modus-operandi has become all too common in the climate of college basketball (as well as college football). This movie is a powerful and introspective commentary on what has become a prevalent problem.

"Blue Chips" is a must movie for any fan of sports, as well as persons who are concerned with the goings-on of Intra-collegiate athletics. Besides Nolte's sensational perfomance, there are also some fun cameos of Rick Pitino, Larry Bird Bobby Knight & others. If the film didn't include Haradaway & O'Neal, it would be worthy of 5 stars, easy.

Had to review this for a sport law class. Great movie. Learning lesson to future athletes about what's right and what's not. This could improve or start their moral foundation so please watch it before they do and create a positive fostered environment with your team.

This was a great movie.The price was a good value also.Service was great an all around good experience with purchase.