Watch Blue Chips For Free

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

good back-story, and good acting

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

"Blue Chips" is a vastly under-rated sports film which deals with the shady dealings of colleges and their players. Nick Nolte plays a college basketball coach who is so desperate to return to his glory days that he breaks the rules by giving his newest recruits (Shaquille O'Neal, Anfernee Hardaway, and Matt Nover) basically anything they and their families want. School alumnus J.T. Walsh is the catalyst to these shady dealings and now the college has a winning team again, but at what price? "Blue Chips" is another one of William Friedkin's films that is much deeper than it first appears on the surface. With the exception of "The French Connection" and "The Exorcist", this is his finest film as a director. His documentary-style makes you feel as if you are in on all the action. Numerous parts are played by real basketball players and coaches, adding a great bit of realism to the story. "The French Connection" benefited from this style by having real cops in key roles and "The Exorcist" did the same having priests play themselves. Shaquille O'Neal, Anfernee Hardaway, and Matt Nover do surprisingly well with the material. They are all three-dimensional characters and shine throughout the film. However with that said, it is Nick Nolte who is the primary factor that makes the film well worth while. Far from perfect, but still a very good movie. 4 out of 5 stars.

Pete Bell (Nick Nolte) is the hard-pressed college basketball coach of Western University running a seemingly clean program. Reporter Ed (Ed O'Neill) has been hounding him about an alleged point shaving incident four years ago. He has his first losing season after winning a few championships. He pushes his team to recruit harder. Butch McRae (Penny Hardaway)'s mother Lavada (Alfre Woodard) wants to be compensated. Farm boy Ricky Roe is more interested in girls. Neon Boudeaux (Shaq) traveled a winding road under the recruiters' radar and scored horribly with his SAT. Pete uses his ex-wife Jenny (Mary McDonnell) as his tutor. His idealism is constantly being worn away by school booster Happy (J.T. Walsh).Nick Nolte holds this together as much as possible. There are many cameos. It's overloaded and some of it is unnecessary. There's no point in having Larry Bird. The movie has so much already. It could trim some of the extras. It has to tighten the first act because it is still waiting to introduce the new players. It's not until midpoint when Shaq finally shows up. Shaq doesn't deserve his Razzie. He's got natural charisma. It's also hard to make this team an underdog with Shaq around. The college ball corruption discussion can be overwrought but I'm fine with that.

Money corrupts in "Blue Chips", one of director William Friedkin's better films. It stars the always watchable Nick Nolte as a basketball coach who breaks regulations, rules and bribery statutes in order to put together a winning team.Nolte often plays tortured characters who crumble under the weight of guilt and self-hatred. Here his character, Pete Bell, starts off as a confident con-man but eventually becomes a hunchbacked wreck. In the film's climactic sequence (possibly informed by a decade's worth of NCAA athletic scandals), Bell stands before journalists and delivers an almighty confession, denouncing the corruption which spawns organically from systems reliant upon profit, loss and winning at any cost. Evocative of "And Justice For All", which featured a similar last-act rant by Al Pacino, the film also anticipates Spike Lee's "He Got Game", another basketball flick which milks similar themes.7.9/10 – Worth one viewing.

Friedkin outlines Nick Nolte's Coach Bell as a guy who's on the spot. Shoulders arched and head low, Bell moves through unadorned halls, overcrowded locker rooms. "There's not one of you that's learned how to win!" He thunders out, slamming the door only to come back to heave a water tank across the room and trudge out again. On the court, fans shouting, cheerleaders abound, band playing, Bell's face is anxious, his fuse lit again. Cries and chaos churn around Bell like he's within a bulldozer. His university team plays vigorously, but drop the ball, miss hoops. He hangs a towel overhead to shield his eyes. At loggerheads with a ref, Bell kicks the ball up into the stands and is disqualified. After winning national championships, Nolte's Bell is at risk of having his first losing season. And joblessness.He could procure blue chip prospects, giving them cash, cars, etc. But in two respects he's unable to take advantage. Primarily, "if I break the rules I get kicked out of coaching." Next, "I might not get caught." It's Bell's ethical predicament. Blue Chips is not about the fight for victory but the fight to defeat. That's the appeal. Bell's passion for winning forces him to be disloyal to himself. Contempt comes in the figure of J.T. Walsh's gladly corrupt, obnoxious alum. When Bell refuses his first proposal of money to draft blue chip players, he tells Bell they make millions for the university for nothing in return and a multi-year contract for him, that they're owed these inducements. Bell storms off but the press-stud is in as he can see no other way. It's the vehicle for Bell's self-destruction.Director William Friedkin's drawn to desperate characters with very few choices. His portrayal of college basketball bribery may be pessimistic, and Bell may be having an emergency of principles, but it's not especially gripping. His ex-wife Mary McDonnell asks him if he cheated. He denies it. Later, when she learns the facts, she sobbingly says she can't trust him anymore. A point-shaving rumor has hung over Bell for awhile. Walsh says it's true, go look at the tape. Bell does. His response is somewhat stupid, saying with surprise that he coached a rigged game. Bell wasn't a schemer but a dupe! He's acting like he perpetrated an offense against humankind. After his recently bought team's climactic game, Bell says words he never thought he'd say. It's paradoxical, but what does it matter? Friedkin tries to infuse some visual strength into the narrative when one of Bell's procured athletes tells the Coach he's homesick but if he goes, will his mother lose her new house that the "friends of the program" gave her? Bell pretends unawareness of any "arrangement." Friedkin begins the scene at Dutch angles, calling direct awareness to itself, the purpose vague. Is it showing Bell's world growing uncontrollable? We already got that when he sat alone in the gym staring longingly at the championship banners, imagined the cheering of past triumphs, sees no option but to cheat. Or when his wife asked him if he deceived and he denies. Bell approaches the gym before the final game, and we see him from another Dutch angle. They seem incompatible and bland here.There are of course elements of Ron Shelton's script that Friedkin helms shrewdly. Bell's introductory locker talk and the first game, for instance. Later, Bell follows coaches who are also probing blue chip possibilities. One of them is Ricky from French Lick. They watch a main street parade highlighting the town pet, Larry Bird, and Ricky riding together in a convertible. The coaches beckon but then look shocked as Friedkin shows Bell, grinningly gesturing back at them from the driver's seat.Another high point is the introduction of Shaq's character Neon in a Louisiana backwoods storehouse playing ruthless street basketball, a Goliath smashing the ball through the hoop over and over, his fierce expression defying the other players to face up to him. Bell's jaw gapes. One other highlight: Bell calls Walsh, Friedkin cuts from the miserable Bell to Walsh at the vast pool in back of his lavish home, drink in hand, his generous tummy laboring the strip of his red trunks, barking to "sell this spoiled brat on how happy he really is!" Friedkin returns to Bell, his throat parched as he turns to the homesick youngster. Nolte's words almost snag in his esophagus, "You better be at practice on Monday." Weak and trampled, Bell knows he's property now. It's painful. The gimmicky Dutches almost spoil it totally.Ultimately, Friedkin's basketball footage brings about frenzied, dynamic action, from the players hurling across the court to coaches speedily drawing plays in clammy clusters. They're impressions, rapid and fuming. Staying at court level, Friedkin seizes the hostility of the sport in volatile surges. Though effective as moments, Friedkin hits the backboard, even bounces off the rim, but rarely goes through the net.