Because someone had to see it.

Yeah, I enjoyed this. I'm a sucker for these kinds of movies.

The movie has a couple of problems from an editing standpoint as it feels like some key scenes were missing. For instance, the entire heart of the film is that Voss is fighting to keep the music department and therefor the head of that departments (Henry Winkler) job. There's a scene towards the end of the film where Voss finds out that the school's superintendent has been embezzling the money that Voss has earned fighting and that his efforts have seemingly gone for not. The very next scene should be of Voss explaining what has happened to Winkler's character, since of course that's the heart of the film, but that scene doesn't exist. Yet it's inferred later that the talk has happened. So why rob the film of drama? Was the scene that bad that it needed to be cut out? There are a couple of instances in the film where this kind of thing happens and it becomes slightly annoying.

What's also annoying is that the jump Voss takes from being barely an amateur to a decent fighter is a little too quick. He jumps from horrible, to good, to the finale where he's a UFC fighter. The movie takes place in the second half of a school year. The movie doesn't show enough of him training, so how the hell did that happen?

There's also the handling of Voss' arc where he goes from becoming a lazy teacher to inspiring his students. First there's a scene that's way to reminiscent of Dead Poet's Society so there's one strike against it. But the motivation to better his students seemingly comes out of nowhere. I think we're supposed to believe that what he's doing in the ring is also apparently motivating him to become a better teacher, but there's no evidence shown of that. We're just supposed to assume.

Honestly, ten minutes of filler scenes and I think all of my major complaints would disappear. Instead the movie appears to be a slave to it's 90 minute running time that it instead opts to become lazy.

However, as I said I'm a sucker for these kinds of movies and it's sweethearted attitude ultimately wins out. And I also thought the movie was much funnier than I expected it to be. Maybe that's because Adam Sandler is nowhere to be found doing a Boston accent?

So yes, the movie has it's problems, but if you're a fan of these kinds of movies, chances are you'll like this one too.

*** (B)