Scott LeBrun The President (Sir Christopher Lee) of L.A. College issues an ultimatum to his athletic director Beetlebom (R.G. Armstrong): produce a championship team, or else. Beetlebom agrees to give tennis coach Chip Williams (Richard "Shaft" Roundtree) a chance, otherwise the whole tennis program is kaput. Naturally, Chips' tennis team is full of life-of-the-party type misfits.Provided one can tolerate the flagrant stereotypes among the characters and the very 80s trappings of the presentation, "Jocks" offers a mildly engaging rehash of that time-honored "misfits make good" formula. And make no mistake, it IS formulaic, with roadblocks put in our heroes' path, but never much doubt that they'll prove to be stand up guys. Since this is also a Crown International movie, rest assured that it's reasonably exploitative, with a generous dose of breast shots.The main hero is a guy known only as "The Kid" (Scott Strader), and his assorted teammates include a Mexican (Trinidad Silva), a Prince lookalike (Stoney Jackson), an enormous bearded goon (Don Gibb, a.k.a. Ogre from "Revenge of the Nerds"), a worry wart (Perry Lang), and a gambling expert (Adam Mills). Their nemeses include the smarmy duo Tony (Christopher Murphy) and Chris (Tom Shadyac, future director of things like "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective", "The Nutty Professor" with Eddie Murphy, and "Liar Liar"). And adding eye candy are appealing Katherine Kelly Lang as Julie and future TV star Mariska Hargitay (in one of her earliest roles). The actors are likable enough, but the ones who come off the best are the veterans like Lee (it's odd, but nice to see him in this sort of setting) and Armstrong (you keep wanting to snatch the toupee off his head).Adequate location shooting in Las Vegas, a peppy rock soundtrack, and some decent action on the tennis court make this an acceptable diversion for 91 minutes.Six out of 10.

BA_Harrison Unless they can win a championship, LA College's tennis team will lose their scholarships, and their coach (Richard Roundtree) will be out of a job. At their next competition in Las Vegas, the players pull out all the stops to win, employing a variety of underhanded techniques in an effort to undermine their opponents' confidence, but find that the team from arch rivals Dallas Tech are just as devious in their methods.An important factor of many decent teen comedies is a likable protagonist; Jocks, from director Steve Carver, not only features a thoroughly obnoxious lead character, a self obsessed douche by the name of The Kid (Scott Strader), but his friends are just as irritating, making the film a thoroughly charmless affair made all the worse by a lack of decent jokes, some really dull sporting scenes, and the pitiful sight of Christopher Lee slumming it as a strict college president (just one of the actor's many career low points).The presence of the lovely Mariska Hargitay (as Dallas Tech babe Nicole, who inexplicably takes a shine to The Kid) makes matters a little easier to bear, as do the film's few moments of gratuitous female nudity, but as a whole, Jocks scores very few points.

Wizard-8 "Jocks" was filmed in 1984 and subsequently spent a few years on the shelf before getting released. Watching it, it's easy to guess why that happened. First, the "humor" in this movie isn't all that funny - it resorts to tired gags about people driving falling-apart cars and transvestites. Also, there are surprisingly a number of moments when the movie doesn't even seem to be trying to be funny - it's about half serious most of the time, in fact. The characters are uninteresting for the most part, save for Donald Gibb's character, which seems to have been lifted from another, more humorous and energetic movie. The tennis sequences are dull, relying on the same two camera angles over and over. As for the "R" rated material, most people I think will be disappointed - for the first hour, there is NOTHING beyond a "G" rating other than utterances of the words "t*ts" and "s*hit". Then there is some wet t-shirt and topless stuff, but none of it is displayed for very long. The only audience for this movie might be for die-hard Christopher Lee fans, since this is one of his rare appearances in a comedy - or should I say so-called comedy.

Woodyanders Amiable college varsity Coach Chip Williams (the always solid Richard Roundtree of "Shaft" fame) has to whip his wacky team of misfit players into shape for a major regional tournament being held in Las Vegas. Said wacky misfits include charming stud muffin on wheels the Kid (hunky Scott Strader), affable mellow dude Jeff (cute Perry Lang), raucous wildman Ripper (the incredible Donald Gibb; Ogre from "Revenge of the Nerds"), and excitable Mexican Chito (the hilarious Trinidad Silva). But these nutty guys are more interested in having fun than winning a big game. Capably directed with infectiously easy'n'breezy panache by Steve Carver, with bright, sunny cinematography by Adam Greenberg, lots of cool-jammin' songs on the bouncy soundtrack, an endearingly sweet'n'silly tone, engaging acting from the likable and attractive young leads, a groovy, hard-rockin' score by David McHugh, cheap gay jokes, a priceless sequence in a sleazy biker bar, a nice smattering of gratuitous nudity, and several thrilling tennis games, this flick overall rates as an entertainingly lightweight diversion. The eclectic supporting cast qualifies as a substantial plus: future "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" TV series regular Mariska Hargitay as adorable tennis groupie Nicole, Christopher Lee as pompous killjoy college President White, R.G. Armstrong as bumbling, sycophantic athletic director Coach Bettleborn, and future mainstream movie director Tom ("Liar, Liar," "Bruce Almighty") Shadyac as arrogant rival tennis champ Chris. Good, goofy fun.