Blue Chips

1994 "Victory doesn't come cheap."
6.3| 1h48m| PG-13| en| More Info
Released: 18 February 1994 Released
Producted By: Paramount
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
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Pete Bell, a college basketball coach is under a lot of pressure. His team isn't winning and he cannot attract new players. The stars of the future are secretly being paid by boosters. This practice is forbidden in the college game, but Pete is desperate and has pressures from all around.

Genre

Drama

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Director

William Friedkin

Production Companies

Paramount

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Blue Chips Audience Reviews

Lovesusti The Worst Film Ever
Glucedee It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.
Maleeha Vincent It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.
Ezmae Chang This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
RaoulGonzo Nick Nolte plays a college University basketball coach forced to break the rules in order to stay competitive. He deals with guilt and struggles internally with something he has always been against.What a surprise Blue Chips was, expecting a below par sports movie (based on reviews) but found a thought provoking and entertaining 110 minutes. To begin with it hits the normal sports movie beats but just when you think the drama is going one way, suddenly it doesn't and that only adds realism to the action.William Friedkin does an excellent job in creating a tense and real life atmosphere, almost documentary style at least during the game-play scenes that makes you feel fully immersed. It's clear Friedkin and co have thoroughly researched this area and you get a sense of that while watching. The use of real life Basketball players and coaches adds to the authenticity.During the drama the film deals with the shady dealings that no doubt goes on in American sports at college level (It's a massive deal, where careers and futures are made). A story of greed, cheating and pressure to win. Nolte is great in the role and gets to show off his soft side while also providing his well known manic style. Blue Chips really is an under-rated film although not perfect it deserves to be more well known.
tieman64 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.
namashi_1 Nick Nolte is Outstanding in his portrayal of a frustrated, ambitious basketball coach in 'Blue Chips'. The legendary actor, who's had a career full of amazing performances, tops himself, yet again with his portrayal in here. 'Blue Chips' Synopsis: A college basketball coach is forced to break the rules in order to get the players he needs to stay competitive.'Blue Chips' is an interesting watch. Ron Shelton's Screenplay is grasping & often-confounding. It depicts a human-story, full of human-emotions & gives Nolte ample score to the anchor the film. William Friedkin's Direction is good. Performance-Wise: Nolte is the life of the show. He's in complete command & holds the film from start to end. Its amongst his greatest performances, that proves us once again, what a fine actor Nolte is!On the whole, 'Blue Chips' works & Nolte doesn't miss a single beat.
bayou_hannibal Blue Chips was a movie that was at least a decade ahead of its time, and its story is more relevant today than when the movie came out. It presents a question that other sports movies, including amateur sports movies, haven't explored. Namely, why should you bother to follow the rules when cheating is already widespread? Is it wrong to cheat if that's what it takes to compete? Is widespread cheating in amateur athletics the inevitable result of fans' obsession with winning? This movie would seem to suggest that the answers to those last two questions are "no" and "yes". Almost every other sports movie of the past 50 years has had some kind of uplifting ending, but this one ends mostly on a downer.Nick Nolte plays a college basketball coach, coaching at a major California basketball school (which might as well be UCLA), clearly modeled after Bobby Knight. He's a hot-tempered, aging and increasingly frustrated, old-school guy whose record has slipped in recent years. A shady booster enters the picture, trying to convince him that if he wants to be on top again, he has to start playing "the game" with recruits. He has to start making deals. Coach Nolte is initially hostile to the guy, but after it looks like he's going to get shut out of getting three huge recruits, he reluctantly changes his mind. Nolte gives an excellent performance in this movie. Everything that he does in the movie, whether it's angry tantrums against refs or the occasional dose of humor, he does well. He is convincing as a guy who just wants to mold student-athletes and coach the game that he loves. The speech that he gives at the end is priceless.The more I read about recruiting, especially basketball recruiting, the more I feel like I need to take a shower. This movie perfectly captures the sleaze of the sport during its recruiting scenes. There's the scum bag "deal maker" mother, who tries to peddle her influence to the highest bidder. There is the superstar white kid, who recognizes his value and demands a huge pile of cash. One kid eventually gets a new car. The movie ultimately presents a pretty revolting picture of college athletics, and if you have followed the scandals at places like Auburn, you know that it is pretty accurate.This movie could have been a failure, but it has that one important trait that all great sports movies have. It was made with a genuine love and respect for the sport. There is a lot of basketball porn in this movie, perhaps even too much. There are scenes that show Nolte coaching Xs and Os. The coaches yell out a bunch of terminology during practices and games, as opposed to 95% of sports movies, where coaches never sound like actual coaches. Blue Chips tries to be one of the more realistic sports movies ever made, and it largely succeeds. It perhaps goes a little too far though with the basketball porn, showing tons and tons of slam dunks and three pointers. If you watch this movie, you would get the impression that 90% of the scoring in basketball is due to these two plays. It also has a somewhat annoying appearance by Dick Vitale, which serves no purpose except to remind you that you are watching a basketball movie. The movie also shoehorns a few too many current basketball stars into it. That might have made it sell better at the time, but do you really care now whether Penny Hardaway and Bobby Hurley appear in it? (And Hurley plays for Indiana in this movie – LULZ).The worst part about this movie, ultimately, is the casting of the basketball stars in it. Namely, Shaquille O'Neal, who can't act his way out of a paper bag. To make matters worse, they give his character the most interesting background story, that of a Gulf War veteran with a "Black power, we shall overcome" type attitude. He's awful. He's really awful. It's as if he had a part written for Ice Cube or Denzel Washington, but then the studio decided that they needed a big name star in the case. He doesn't have many lines, but the ones that he has are not good.Blue Chips is one of those sports movies that you should see at least once. It's unlikely that you will remember it amongst the best that you have seen, but if you follow college athletics, you should at least find it interesting. Blue Chips shows us the hypocrisy of college athletics, and the seemingly futile endeavor of trying to keep money out of the hands of athletes. It is though provoking, albeit a bit preachy. Given the current debates about whether we should be paying players, this movie is now more relevant than it ever has been.