InsidePulse DVD Review – Annapolis

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Director
Justin Lin…Director

Cast
James Franco…Jake Huard
Tyrese Gibson…Cole
Jordana Brewster…Ali
Donnie Wahlberg…Lt. Cmdr. Burton
Chi McBride…McNally
Vicellous Shannon…Twins
Roger Fan…Loo
Wilmer Calderon…Estrada

The Movie

James Franco is probably best known as being the Green Goblin’s son in the Spiderman movies. But Annapolis proves he can hold a movie pretty well on his own.

Franco plays Jake Huard, a do-nothing that works on the dock yard with his father and dreams of getting into the Naval Academy, conveniently right across the river from he dock yard. He also dabbles in semi-pro boxing, knocking out his friend in the first scene of the movie.

Soon after he finds out from Lt. Cmdr. Burton that he has been accepted to the academy because “some kids decided they’d rather have fun in college.” Jake is in great shape, but really doesn’t have his stuff together when it comes to the academics of it all. Trying mightily to just get by, Jake encounters Cole, played pretty well by Tyrese Gibson. Cole is a take no prisoners human being that rides Jake, hoping he’ll quit.

From there on it is Jake trying to get into Cole’s weight class in the Brigades, the biggest military event aside from the Army-Navy game. It is a boxing tournament that lets the plebe’s get their shot at their commanding officers.

What happens? Well, it’s pretty safe to assume at this point, as the movie plays out rather easily, with the biggest question being whether Jake will get it on with Ali, his other commanding officer, on screen.

The weird thing about this movie is that it is cast perfectly. I say weird because with a different cast this movie could have played out so much better than it did. Odd to say, but it’s true. Everyone is perfect for their parts, including Jordana Brewster. But in the end if you take them out and insert other people, you have a bigger hit and a better movie overall. This is a great story lacking a big name to sell it.

Score: 7/10

The Video

Anamorphic Widescreen that looks fantastic. The white in the uniforms really shows!

The Audio

Dolby Digital 5.1: Sounds darn good.

The Extras

The Brigades – An in depth look into the Brigades tournament, what it means and how they did it in the movie. Cool little feature, nothing astonishing to note.

Plebe Year: The Story of Annapolis – Basically a “making of” feature on getting everything to work to bring the idea to film. Again, nothing astonishing.

Deleted Scenes – Nothing to note, although the movie could have several different avenues to go down if they kept some of these in.

Score: 7/10

InsidePulse’s Ratings for Annapolis
CATEGORY
RATING
(OUT OF 10)
THE MOVIE

7
THE VIDEO

9
THE AUDIO

9
THE EXTRAS

7
REPLAY VALUE

7
OVERALL
7
(NOT AN AVERAGE)