本周票房排行榜上，《重振球风》遥遥领先，作为一部运动题材的电影，其带给观众的冲击力是相当大的：西恩·波特决定组建一支感化院橄榄球队，希望通过橄榄球这项综合了团结与对抗等多重拼搏内容在内的对抗性比赛，来逐渐将一群不务正业的少年拉到正途上来。在经历了几番周折之后，感化院的橄榄球队终于取得了参加正规高中联赛的机会。孩子们最终被社会承认他们的尊严和地位，也在一次次的比赛中重拾自信。
　　
A group of colorful, rebellious young felons at a California juvenile detention camp molded into a winning team by their hard-driving probation officer/coach, Sean Porter (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson)--was based on a 1992 documentary of the same title by the same producer, Lee Stanley. At the end, we even see brief excerpts from that 1992 doc, with the real-life Sean Porter and the players' counterparts doing and saying some of the same things we've heard in the movie.

Directed by Phil Joanou , "Gang" is pitched as a mix of gritty street crime drama and heroic sports thriller-comedy--a kind of cross between "Boyz n the Hood" and "The Longest Yard." It takes place at Camp Kilpatrick, an actual detention camp located near Malibu, and Joanou shows these fictionalized guys in the hood--especially future running star Willie Weathers (Jade Yorker) and his rival-gang foe, future defensive star Kelvin Owens (David Thomas)--and then under Coach Porter's hard-knuckle, warm-hearted regime.

"The Rock's" Sean may have an occasionally nasty mouth and a prettier face than Vince Lombardi, but here, down deep, he's the same tough but fatherly molder-of-men we've seen from Pat O'Brien's Knute Rockne on. Sean, a man of biceps and principle, depressed by the grim futility of the camp and the violence of the boys, decides that football is the way to turn surly young thugs into citizens. Along with sidekick Malcolm Moore (Xzibit), he sets up the Camp Kilpatrick Mustangs, gets them uniforms and equipment, and arranges a schedule of games with top local high school teams.

Much of "Gridiron Gang," including that finale, is based on fact. But, as written by Jeff Maguire ("In the Line of Fire"), the movie veers wildly from violent melodrama to comedy to sermonizing, becoming, in this tangle, yet another movie demonstration of how school sports and good coaches can level society's playing fields, and give young athletes a sense of community and purpose.

Playing Sean, "The Rock" commendably tries to broaden the hitherto comic-book hero range of his parts in movies such as "The Mummy Returns," "The Scorpion King" and (his best) "The Rundown." There's even a scene between Sean and his desperately ill mother, along with lots of tough-love wrangles with his kids. But, while "The Rock" is more than fit for the kind of roles Gov. Schwarzenegger will no longer play, he's perhaps too flamboyant a personality right now to comfortably play Sean, a role that seems better for a lower-key, more realistic actor, a younger Gene Hackman or Morgan Freeman.

As sports movies go, "Gridiron Gang" isn't bad, just not top-line material. Even when it plays its heart out, this movie's cliche environment drags it down.