“Make sure you tell Lattimer that the NCAA will be testing on Saturday.”

Drake’s rating: Caaaaaaan!!! Oh, wait. I did this joke last time. Darn it.

Drake’s review: Y’all are ready for the Big Game, right? The one between those two teams that blocks out a dozen hours of Sunday programming time every year and features advertisements that pay more for a fleeting second of air time than my house is worth? That’s right, it’s time for the Superb Owl*, that ostentatious display of rampant commercialism that will see one team hoisting a trophy high, while the losing team can only watch from the sidelines as the now-worthless T-shirts and hats proclaiming their nonexistent victory are air-dropped into African nations who have likely never heard of the NFL, but do know that something called the Buffalo Bills** exist.

So to celebrate the fact that football is over for the season, I thought I’d review a football movie. And by that I mean American football, not the football that’s played around the world by millions and actually has constant interaction between one’s foot and the ball. And since there aren’t that many good football movies, I figure I might as well go with… Necessary Roughness! That’s right, I think it’s time that quirky, feel-good movie about a bunch of lovable misfits banding together as a team just in time to eke out a crucial win deserves an entry in the Mutant annals.

Which it already has. Huh. I really should pay more attention.

Well, what I meant to say was that it’s about time for The Replacements, that other football flick about a bunch of lovable misfits banding together as a team just in time to eke out a crucial win, to have a Mutant Review.

Oh, wait, it does. In fact, it has three of them. Yikes. OK, hold on, guys. You all just hang out for a bit while I find another football movie to watch. Feel free to talk amongst yourselves.

[Cut to: Two hours later.]

OK, the movie I really meant to review was The Program, which doesn’t so much feature lovable misfits as it does troubled college football players dealing with drug abuse, alcoholism and illiteracy. Still, they do band together as a team to eke out a crucial win, so that’s something.

So here we have Sam Winters (James Caan, Rollerball) as a beleaguered coach at the generically-named Eastern State University. Winters is warned that he’s going to be an unemployed coach in about a year if he doesn’t get ESU to a bowl game, which means finding new players and getting his star quarterback Joe Kane (Craig Sheffer, Nightbreed) on the straight and narrow.

Because Kane is troubled, you see. He’s an alcoholic from a family of alcoholics, and thus descends into depression and self-destructive behavior in between bouts of brooding. And brood he does, with so much furrowing of his brow that one has to wonder if David Boreanaz watched this movie over a marathon weekend to prep for his role as Angel. If so, he must have taken hair care tips from Sheffer as well, as Kane’s coif never lacks in volume or fluff.

Still, a brooding QB is the least of Winters’ problems. He also has to deal with players who, despite being in college, refuse to learn more than their playbooks and a defensive lineman named Steve Lattimer (Andrew Bryniasrki, 2003’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) who went from special teams afterthought to starting defensive end after mysteriously gaining 35 pounds of muscle over the Summer. Lattimer, for his part, is so happy to make the team that he literally headbutts cars to celebrate.

Sure, nothing weird going on with Lattimer.

Writer/director David S. Ward was an experienced hand with ensemble sports comedies, having also been the creative mind behind Major League. The Program is nowhere near as sure-footed a film, however. It’s not a comedy, although there are humorous bits scattered throughout, but as a drama it also falls short, simply because the dramatic bits are so strait-laced that they at times veer into near parody by themselves. The casting of Sheffer alone raises eyebrows, since the actor was in his early 30s at the time, just a few years younger than Scott Bakula’s “old man QB” in Necessary Roughness. And because Sheffer’s a decade or so older than most of the actors surrounding him, the age difference is hilariously apparent.

Honestly, when he makes goo-goo eyes at Kristy Swanson, you’re thinking less “Aww, how cute” and more, “Hey, where’s campus security?”

The Program is not a bad movie but it is a somewhat trite one. With the exception of the Lattimer storyline, which is admittedly well-executed both in front of and behind the camera, it’s fairly standard fare, and if you’ve ever seen a sports movie (really, any sports movie), then you’ve seen this one already. There aren’t many surprises here, but it’s still a fun watch if you’re in the mood for a football flick that does approach the sport with some honesty, and points out many of the inherent problems with having a sports program in a university setting.

And, even at nearly two hours, it’s still a much shorter watch than any given Superb Owl.

*Names have been changed to protect Mutant Reviewers from the legal ramifications of stepping on the massive yet sensitive toes of the No Fun League.

**The Bills dropped four Owls in a row in the ‘90s. That’s a lot of losing merch to inflict on anyone.

Intermission!

• I eagerly awaited recruitment from a university looking to capitalize on my talents as well, but being able to perform the complete KISS Alive II album on a kazoo was not in demand. Their loss.
• I might be wrong, but I think you want to throw the ball to your own team.
• Beer cans on the Christmas tree is gonna be my new holiday tradition.
• Men in suits looking serious. Seriously.
• Say what you want about the coach’s daughter hooking up with the backup QB, but at least she’s steering clear of Old Man Sheffer.
• And speaking of Kane, terrifying your date with a frantic motorcycle ride is not a first date thing. Or even a one-hundred and first date thing.
• The “Kane is Able” Heisman campaign is so ridiculously stupid that it almost makes this flick believable.
• Brooding. Much brood.
• Date night is not the time for ‘roid-raging, Lattimer. I swear, the women in this flick put up with waaaaaaaay too much crap.
• What?!! The guy who refuses to even learn how to spell his name and is coasting his way through college on his athletic prowess is going to have a career-ending injury? Who could have seen that one coming?
• More brooding. The broodiest.
• Can they come back and win the game? Will Omar Epps get the girl? Will Sheffer’s hair stay fluffy? Will Lattimer juice up to the gills, turn green and get his own TV show where he’s always on the run, pursued by an investigative reporter
• Of course, yes, as long as he has product, and unfortunately no.