This clip above is towards the end of the film during the gym lockout. The lockout is voted to end and as the coach walks into the gym he finds all of the students with their teachers studying and completing their work in order to meet the contracts which they had signed earlier on in the year. Throughout the movie, the coach keeps on asking this student "What is your deepest fear" and the student never replies. However, in this scene the student replies and tells the coach "Our deepest fear". This is the same student who attempts to hit the coach at the start of the movie. Therefore this clip shows how the coach has changed the attitudes of the students and how the stereotypes and representations are now being challenged instead of followed.

The video above shows the first meeting between the Richmond basketball team, and their new coach. In the clip one of the students shows attitude to the coach and treats him like a man of his own age as he talks disrespectfully, eventually the student attempts to punch the coach, and the coach blocks the punch and pushes the student into the wall. This clip clearly outlines the manners which the students in Richmond have been brought up with and follows the representations and stereotypes which have been attached to them.

Above we can see a clip from the movie coach carter. the clip shows some of the negative attention the coach received from the residents in Richmond for locking up the gym and forfeiting matches. In the clip, a man confirms with the coach whether he is coach carter or not and once the coach replies yes, the man attempts to spit on the coach but manages to spit on the window. the coach reacts by getting out of his car and is confronting the man and then his son steps out of the car and holds him back as the resident drives off. this clip reflects the manners which the elders have been brought up with in Richmond, it shows how immaturely the man handles a situation and it says something about the role models that the teenagers are meant to look up to.

Analysis

To what extent is the stereotypical representation of black people challenged with particular reference to Coach Carter (2005)

Media Language

•Alot of urban clothing is shown at the start of the movie such as hoodies, baseball caps, baggy clothing etc. Props such as guns are used to canote violence and danger, as well as drug dealing - stereotypical view of a young black adult

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•A number of different camera shots are used throughout the movie, there are a number of long shots used whilst showing the Richmond basketball team, and this has been done in order to present the team as a whole.. Close ups are used in a number of scenes in order to show the facial expressions of the students when they are rude to their basketball coach.

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•The movie is set in Richmond, California, USA

Institution

•MTV

•Domestic –

•Opening Weekend: $24,182,961(2,524 theaters, $9,581 average)% of Total Gross: 36.0%Widest Release: 2,574 theaters

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•Overall Domestic: $67,264,877 87.7%

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•Internationally: $9,404,929 12.3%

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•Worldwide: $76,669,806

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•As shown above, the movie did not do as well internationally as it did domestically.

Genre

•Genre: Drama/Sport

•Coach Carter is not no ordinary movie with a message but it is a movie based on a passionate basketball coach who locks up their school gym and cancels matches as the team do not perform academically. It consists of skilful basketball matches and a turn of events that you wouldn't see in any usual sport movie.

Representation

•Black people are first represented as promoting anti-social behaviour, one of the ways in which this is shown in the movie is through drug dealing, violence and with use of props such as guns. Anti-social behaviour is also shown when one of the students shows attitude to the coach and tries to hit him in the face but the coach grabs him and pushes him into the wall.

•Throughout the movie, the representations of black males is challenged as the students begin to focus on their school work and they stop the violence and crime due to the guidance of the coach.

Audience

•Teenagers – sends a message to teenagers which is stay out of trouble and show commitment towards school work before any hobbies.

•Adults – kind of creates a moral panic that the students of today are not focusing in school academically as they are too busy doing something else.

•Sports/basketball fans – movie is aimed at fans as they may be interested in basketball and might want to see the matches played and the tricks of the game.

•MTV generation – a lot of urban clothing and urban slang used such as the “N” word therefore this may interest the urban MTV crowd

Ideology

Men are shown as the match winners as they are playing and winning the basketball matches where as the women are shown as cheerleaders who support the men, therefore this film could promote patriarchal values.

Narrative

•Coach Carter doesn’t follow Propps theory of character roles as there is no real villain in the movie, however, Coach Carter could be argued to be the hero of the movie as he is the one who leads the team through the season and improves their academic skills.

Social

Raises a moral panic - Alerts society that students go to school to learn. if academic results are not good enough, then other activities should be banned.

Historical

•Black youths have been known to be abusive and violent in the past and this movie challenges this stereotype as the students who start off as following the negative black stereotype later challenge it.

comments on selected blogs

Here are the links of the blogs which i have commented on as they are the most relevant to my own:

Anjali

Neelema

Jagjeet

Lamia

Kabir

BBC Review by Neil Smith

When Californian school coach Ken Carter refused to let his undefeated basketball team compete until they bettered their grades, he made headlines across America. Now his principled stand gets the Hollywood treatment in Coach Carter, a slick high-school sports story that balances the usual clichés with an unusually sophisticated, pro-education message. Think Dead Poets Society with a basketball hoop and you'll know the score in Thomas Carter's predictable but enjoyable melodrama, which gifts Samuel L Jackson an eye-catching leading role.
Jackson has taken this kind of mentor part before, most notably in 1997's teacher-goes-postal thriller 187. Here, though, he's in more fatherly mode, his stern taskmaster hiding a sentimental streak as broad as the basketball court on which he holds sway over his unruly squad of rebels. Carter brings the boys in line by calling them "Sir", punishing every offence and making them sign contracts that promise they will pull their collective fingers out in class.

"AN UNCOMMONLY SAVVY MESSAGE"

His tough-but-fair tactics immediately reap dividends in the gym as the Richmond High Oilers sweep the State Championships. But when his pupils fail to keep up their end of the bargain, our hero is forced to take drastic measures. His actions soon set him on a collision course with his charges' parents, the local community and the school board, who place more importance on sporting success than preparing its students for college.
Over long and deeply manipulative, Coach Carter should nonetheless be praised for its far-from-fashionable celebration of personal advancement through academic achievement. Its uncommonly savvy message excuses a multitude of sins - not least Jackson's grandiose speechifying and a coarse depiction of inner-city life that suggests every teenager is either an unmarried mother or a drug-dealing gangster in the making.

Media Attention

I found some newspaper articles which were printed on the front pages of newspapers during 1999 when Coach Ken Carter locked up the school gym and began to cancel matches.

•Benching Dream Team Was Right Move
Los Angeles Times
July 11, 2001

•Coach Ken Carter Shows His Players Much Tough Love!
Endless Possibilities
July 2001

•High school coach imposes own basketball lockout when grades slip
CNN.com Article

•Give me an A!
People Magazine
January 25, 1999

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•Coach Carter: “Average is just not good enough. Period."