A basketball player's father must try to convince him to go to a college so he can get a shorter sentence.
Writer/Director: Spike Lee
Stars: Denzel Washington, Milla Jovovich, Ray Allen.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0124718/
Watched online, mediocre print: sound was out of sync all the time.
Not nearly as tense as most SL films, and without an enormous turning point, this is interesting nonetheless. In addition to the storyline of the father (DW) trying to convince his son to sign with Big State college, we get a dose of the recruiting pressures on a top player, not only from colleges but also the NBA.
We do see the death of DW's wife (the boy's mother), for which he is serving time for murder, and it seems more of a manslaughter case to me. But we don't explore anything about the trial/conviction. Nor does DW try to convince his son it was an accidental death; the son blames him fully, and is very alienated from his father.
The ending is a bit up in the air, which is a good thing dramatically.
Rated 6.9 (40,150)
Touchstone & more, dir. Lee; 7-
