It is not out of the ordinary for moviemakers to depict the negatives of society, including gang life, prison life and the hopelessness of those who may be caught in the wrong situation and commit life changing mistakes.But it is out of the ordinary to see filmmakers show how people can overcome their mistakes and come together for the common good of a cause, despite any hard feelings they may have for those who they work with to achieve the success they strive for.
Gridiron Gang, the movie starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and rapper Xzibit, is a tale about how detention camp probation officers Sean Porter (Johnson) and Malcolm Moore (Xzibit) create a high-school level football team at a detention camp full of teenagers who have committed various crimes and who have minimal solidarity with one another.
Based on a true story, the movie features a recurring theme of how the imprisoned young men needed to transition from being losers to winners, in life as well as on the football field. The idea for forming the team comes to Porter while he drives by football practice of a local high school team.
He believes that an activity, such as football, will fill the void in the life of the kids that gang life had taken prior to their incarceration.
Despite hardships in gaining clearance for the team and finding opponents to play against, Porter is able to overcome these obstacles and try to field the team.
In his mind the only trouble is getting his recruits to buy into the concept of being a team – a task he has only four weeks to get done.
With the team recruited, it is obvious from the start that gaining the trust of the team and teaching players the concept of discipline would be hard. Some of the young men never had any sense of positive direction, came from broken homes, were in gangs, or sometimes all three. The players’ lack of cohesion shows, as they lose their first game by the embarrassing score of 38-0.
However, Porter is persistent, and eventually the team begins to form a cohesiveness that could be admired by teams who had been playing together for longer periods.
Eventually, after being allowed to play in the playoffs, the team would go on to avenge its first defeat.
More importantly, the movie leaves its audience with the uplifting note that only five of the players end up back in prison and many of the rest get back into school.
That is significant considering that normally, 75 percent of juvenile offenders end up back in prison or dead on the streets (this according to the movie and Web sites offering a synopsis of the movie). The players had indeed gone from being losers to being winners.
Gridiron Gang is rated PG-13 and is in theaters today. This movie is a Sony Pictures production.
This article was first published in the The Galveston County Dail News.