Coach Carter is a great movie which brings out a lot of social issues and lessons. It is about the process of why Mr. Carter accepted the job as the coach for the basketball team in Richmond High School which was his old high school in a poor area of Richmond and how he changed the members of his team who are Kenyon Stone, Timo Cruz, Worm, Jason Lyle, Damien Carter and etc.
He took over the job as the coach of the boys’ basketball team. Unfortunately, he troubled school he remembered as a teenager is an even more insufferable place in his adulthood. Determined to make a change in his players' lives, Carter made each young man signed a contract that ensure he will maintain a 2.3 GPA, attend every class, sit in the front row during lessons and wear a jacket and tie on game day. He also called their parents or guardians to come over to explain about the content in the contract. Of course, they all gave bad response. However, they had no choice so they gave in. During the practices, Mr.Carter tried to build up their own disciplines by giving them a lot of punishments and rules. . At practices, Coach Carter puts the team through vigorous conditioning including suicides and push-ups which stretch some of the players beyond their breaking point. The initial resistance from the boys was soon dispelled as the team under Carter's tutelage became an undefeated competitor in the games. They did excellent in their every game. However, when the overconfident team's behavior began to stray and Carter learnt that too many players are doing poorly in class, he took immediate action by locking up the gym and cancelled all the games in order to force the boys to concentrate in their study. Or else, the locked gym will never be opened.
The story came into climax when the school authority conducted a conference on the issue. Coach Carter received some praise and much more criticism for his decision. The final decision of the conference had disappointed Coach Carter and he chose to quit. We are so inquisitive that whether he really wanted to quit. Was it the right decision to leave that time after he did so many struggles and sacrifices? However, his team members supported him and they did say that no one can force them if they did not want to play. They studied hard and obeyed the rule by sitting in the front row since then. Carter was heartened and decided to stay, thanking the players. The team made it into the state high-school championship playoffs. The climactic game took place in the tournament's first round against the first ranked team in the state, St. Francis. Although they were defeated in the end, their spirits never die and Coach Carter was very proud of them. In the end, the 6 players managed to go into colleges to pursue their dreams.
After watching this movie, I found out that there was a lot of cussing. The teenagers tend to use cussing during communication and tend to be rude to the elders as well. Coach Curter tried to change their bad attitudes by calling each others sirs or gentlemen. This showed respect to others and had a good work ethic on the court.
In addition, there are a lot of social issues in this movie. The social issues included gangsters, vandalism, drugs selling, abortion, crime and even family problems. Most of the teenagers were aggressive and tend to solve problems by fighting. Most of the team members were facing their own family’s problems. Their family members may be died or prisoned. One of the members, Timo involved in gang life and he owned a shotgun. His friend also ended up with dead. His friend was shot and died by the street. This case was a serious crime. The other member was also having problem with her girlfriend, Kira who got pregnant. He did not know what to do as he felt that he should took on the responsibility but on the other hand, he also wanted to pursue his dream to play college ball. Finally, they broke up and Kira aborted the baby. For vandalism, we also could see someone breaking into Coach Carter’s sports equipment store by a gang which asked him to let the players play their basketball. Besides that, the school authority also did not do their part to educate the students. There was no proper system and they were subjective. They just wanted the boys to play basketball and win in their games regardless how bad their achievement in the academic.
However, there are plenty of moral values in this movie as well. Timo showed repentance after he witnessed the murder of his cousin. He wanted to get out of gang life and he was welcomed by Coach Carter. This event tells us that we should change to be a better man when we know our faults. The other moral value that I have learnt is that we should have persistence in our life. Coach Carter persisted with his strong determination that he could change the boys and he did it in the end. The boys also persisted in their study and ended up with studying in colleges which was a dream that will never been achieved. Their persistence brought fruition. This movie also showed the willingness to help each other. They were willing to help each other when they faced difficulties in their study. The movie even teaches us that in life we will always have obstacles. It’s up to us to overcome them and be successful. We should dare to take over these obstacles and challenges if we want to success. I learnt that goals in life that seem to be unattainable can really be reached. It teaches me to be responsible as well. We should take full responsibility to the actions we have done. I realized that teen abortion is a irresponsible action and we should avoid this to be happen in our life.
All in all, it is really a great movie and it teaches us a lot of lessons.
