Jocks

Hunky Los Angeles college tennis player Scott Strader (as "The Kid") likes to party more than practice, so straight-laced pal Perry Lang (as Jeff Andrews) is worried about their championship possibilities. When coach Richard Roundtree (as Chip Williams) takes the team to Las Vegas, the nightlife threatens to ruin the tennis team's chance to bring home L.A. College's first trophy ever… Steve Carver's "Jocks" are an undeniably likable group, but their story is filled with dead humor. Don't expect any more than ONE good topless "girls gone wild" moment.

*** Jocks (1987) Steve Carver ~ Scott Strader, Perry Lang, Richard Roundtree

Unless they can win a championship, LA College's tennis team will lose their scholarships, and their coach (Richard Roundtree) will be out of a job. At their next competition in Las Vegas, the players pull out all the stops to win, employing a variety of underhanded techniques in an effort to undermine their opponents' confidence, but find that the team from arch rivals Dallas Tech are just as devious in their methods.

An important factor of many decent teen comedies is a likable protagonist; Jocks, from director Steve Carver, not only features a thoroughly obnoxious lead character, a self obsessed douche by the name of The Kid (Scott Strader), but his friends are just as irritating, making the film a thoroughly charmless affair made all the worse by a lack of decent jokes, some really dull sporting scenes, and the pitiful sight of Christopher Lee slumming it as a strict college president (just one of the actor's many career low points).

The presence of the lovely Mariska Hargitay (as Dallas Tech babe Nicole, who inexplicably takes a shine to The Kid) makes matters a little easier to bear, as do the film's few moments of gratuitous female nudity, but as a whole, Jocks scores very few points.

"Jocks" is indistinguishable from dozens of 80s teen comedies. Even such names as Christopher Lee (what is he doing here??) and Richard Roundtree can't give it much class. It's tame, it's predictable....but it's not dislikable. I'll give it a low rating (*1/2), but fans of such comedies would rate it higher. Those tennis scenes could've been handled better, though.

The President (Sir Christopher Lee) of L.A. College issues an ultimatum to his athletic director Beetlebom (R.G. Armstrong): produce a championship team, or else. Beetlebom agrees to give tennis coach Chip Williams (Richard "Shaft" Roundtree) a chance, otherwise the whole tennis program is kaput. Naturally, Chips' tennis team is full of life-of-the-party type misfits.

Provided one can tolerate the flagrant stereotypes among the characters and the very 80s trappings of the presentation, "Jocks" offers a mildly engaging rehash of that time-honored "misfits make good" formula. And make no mistake, it IS formulaic, with roadblocks put in our heroes' path, but never much doubt that they'll prove to be stand up guys. Since this is also a Crown International movie, rest assured that it's reasonably exploitative, with a generous dose of breast shots.

The main hero is a guy known only as "The Kid" (Scott Strader), and his assorted teammates include a Mexican (Trinidad Silva), a Prince lookalike (Stoney Jackson), an enormous bearded goon (Don Gibb, a.k.a. Ogre from "Revenge of the Nerds"), a worry wart (Perry Lang), and a gambling expert (Adam Mills). Their nemeses include the smarmy duo Tony (Christopher Murphy) and Chris (Tom Shadyac, future director of things like "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective", "The Nutty Professor" with Eddie Murphy, and "Liar Liar"). And adding eye candy are appealing Katherine Kelly Lang as Julie and future TV star Mariska Hargitay (in one of her earliest roles). The actors are likable enough, but the ones who come off the best are the veterans like Lee (it's odd, but nice to see him in this sort of setting) and Armstrong (you keep wanting to snatch the toupee off his head).

Adequate location shooting in Las Vegas, a peppy rock soundtrack, and some decent action on the tennis court make this an acceptable diversion for 91 minutes.

Six out of 10.

Jocks is a production from those purveyors of good taste, Crown International Pictures. In fairness, these guys were responsible for some good movies but most of them came out in the 70's when they put their hand to trends of the day that seemed to work better for them. By the 80's though it appeared to be low budget comedies all the way, and it would not be uncharitable to describe a lot of these as being 'uneven'. Jocks is an example of one of the cinematic staples of the day - the teen sex comedy. Except, there really isn't all that much sex but there is a lot of...tennis. A college sports coach must get a group of misfits under his charge up to a good enough standard to win a tennis tournament in Las Vegas; needless to say, the city attractions coupled with the underhand machinations of their rivals prove a major distraction for his protégés.

Seemingly this one sat on a shelf for a few years, which kind of makes sense when you see that the date of the tournament was '84, yet the film was released in '86. Presumably it was on account of its low quality, although I have frankly seen worse from Crown from the period, although admittedly not that much worse. The comedy is pretty basic stuff and seems to be based primarily around gags that can be elicited from laughing at stereotypes, to that end we have, amongst others, a wild man (played by the guy who starred alongside Jean-Claude Van Damme in Bloodsport (1988) - to say this fella's acting range appears to have been a bit limited would be something of an understatement), there's also a Mexican and a Prince lookalike transvestite. I did chuckle occasionally although I can't actually now even remember what at. So, it's not totally without humour but it is of a very low-brow standard, i.e. an angry man with a beard hitting tennis balls aggressively, out-dated gay humour, etc. It is enlivened a bit by the introduction of some breasts though - by contrast to the humour, this sort of production value never seems to get old for some reason. The film also is kind of notable for improbably starring Christopher Lee as the college head. I think it seems that like many others such as Al Pacino, Harvey Keitel, flared trousers and beards, the 80's was a barren wasteland of a decade for Lee and so he pitched up in some rubbish, only to return with flying colours later on. In the final analysis, this isn't very good but it's not exactly terrible either - if you are a tennis loving Christopher Lee fan, you are probably the demographic that Crown were aiming for, in which case, batter in.