You'll root for coach Woody - but a slam dunk it ain't: BRIAN VINER views ... trends now
Champions (12A, 123 mins)
Rating: 
Verdict: Scores points
Scream VI (18, 123 mins)
Rating:
Verdict: Scarily formulaic
The Spanish film Campeones was a big critical and commercial hit when it came out five years ago. Inspired by real-life events in Valencia, it told the story of a disgraced basketball coach who, after being convicted of drink-driving, was ordered to do community service by taking charge of a team of players with intellectual disabilities.
An English-language version seemed only a matter of time, and here it is: set in Des Moines, Iowa, with Woody Harrelson as assistant coach of a minor-league basketball team, the Iowa Stallions.
I saw Champions at a gala screening on Wednesday in aid of the charity Mencap, in an audience comprised largely of people with learning and other disabilities. The film got a lot of love from them, so I feel disinclined to knock it.
Directed by Bobby Farrelly in his first directorial outing away from his brother Peter (with whom he made the 1994 smash Dumb And Dumber), it’s a modest crowd pleaser. But from where I was sitting, it sets up a series of emotional slam-dunks without quite scoring any of them.
At the start, Marcus (Harrelson) is a world-weary fellow who believes that he is coaching well below his rightful level, and expresses his frustration by getting involved in an on-court fracas, then driving drunk. He is arrested, and duly fired by the Stallions.
Woody Harrelson plays assistant coach of a minor-league basketball team, the Iowa Stallions
A judge orders Marcus (Harrelson) to spend three months coaching The Friends, a team made up of youngsters with Down’s syndrome, degrees of autism and other special needs
Soon, a judge orders him to spend three months coaching The Friends, a team made up of youngsters with Down’s syndrome, degrees of autism and other special needs.
There are echoes of One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), which
