Believe in Me

In 1960s Oklahoma, a high school basketball coach (Jeffrey Donovan) is forced to coach the girls’ team rather than the boys. The inspirational sports movie hits rock bottom (we can only hope) with this no-cliché-left-behind mishmash. Writer-director Robert Collector bases his script on the ostensibly true story of one Jim Keith, changing all the names (and, no doubt, the incidents), and then, incredibly, spends the waning minutes with printed titles that give the “real” story the movie doesn’t tell. Collector neglects to make his hero likable or to give the players any individuality—even the game scenes are dull. To top it all off, snarling villain Bruce Dern gives a performance that makes Snidely Whiplash look subtle and nuanced—he even threatens to foreclose the mortgages of anyone who crosses him.