Remember the Titans is an uplifting movie that just goes to show how team work is all you need. For the most part, the film is tremendous, drawing you into the racial issues of the day without dragging you through a bloodbath.

The film is based on the true story of one high school in Alexandria, Virginia, in 1971. Of course, we're all pretty accustomed to what Hollywood understands to be truth, so what we see in the film has obviously been packaged into a product with an eye for narrative structure.

But it works marvelously well. The story takes place in T.C. Williams High School in 1971, when Alexandria forced its schools to integrate, there was the problem of the football team. Denzel Washington plays Coach Boone, who is brought in to take over as coach, relegating the very successful white Coach Yoast, to his assistant. Neither coach is happy about the situation, but Denzel does what he does best, and takes the helm determined to bring the team into line. Which he does, very painfully.

He packs the team on buses and takes them to football camp, where he tortures them into submission. Finally, when there is no other way out, the black and white lads work together to make a football team like no other.

After they bond as a team--returning on the bus belting out songs, they then have to teach town and the rest of the football league that it's okay to integrate. And, along the way, they have to remind themselves.

The film is really well put together. There are enough moments of comedy, tragedy, conflict and resolution to keep you engrossed. During the credits, its great to see what happened to the coaches and players after the pivotal year of the film.

But the best part of the film, is that it doesn't suggest for a minute that this football experience changed anything other than the people who actually experienced. A cynic might suggest that football can solve the world's problems. What the film actually intimates is that teamwork, working together for a common good is the only way to overcome problems of difference and change.

For the kids and coaches in this environment, it all worked. As it might for a choir, a band, or a math class, when all the members of the team pull together. For that the film is really uplifting, and we can certainly Remember the Titans.


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