The film “Remember the Titans” was released in 2000. It is best known as a Sports Cinema. The main profession of the main characters is associated with the football. Both of the main characters are football coaches. One of the highlighting factor in the movie is the perfect and vibrant professional relationship between the two coaches of football; Herman Boone and Bill Yoast. Their professionalism lies in their initiative to remove the racial discrimination among the team members and establishing a team spirit among them regardless of race. The team spirit is very important for the accomplishment of the team objectives. Both of these coaches know it and they strive hard to establish a healthy professional relationship between both of them as well as among the team members. The healthy professional relationship teaches to overcome the petty disagreements for the accomplishment of the ultimate goals. For example after winning the state championship, Coach Yoast appreciates the efforts taken by Boon. ‘I know football, and what you did with those boys, You were the right man for the job, Coach!’ (Remember the Titans). Boone also appreciates Yoast and gives him credit for winning the match. He calls him the ‘Hall of Famer’, thus motivating each other reflects real professionalism. The film thus conveys the message of working as a team in professional life.
The film portrays an unusual team of football that consisted of the racially discriminated team players. The unusual thing the film tells about the profession as a sportsman is that it is necessary to tune ourselves to the changing circumstances. If we want to achieve the highest goals, we should not get into petty issues such as race. The pampering of racial hatred is not the ultimate goal, but the ultimate goal is to win the match. The film is the portrayal of the era during Civil Movement. The political and social issue is depicted in the film through the football game.
On the background of the football, the film conveys the message of loving each other as a human being rather than hating the person on the basis of his colour. In this context, the dialogue of Yoast is very apt, when he says:
‘Yeah. I hope you boys have learned as much from me this year as I've learned from you. You've taught this city how to trust the soul of a man rather than the look of him. And I guess it's about time I joined the club’ (Remember the Titans). When the hatred and racial violence was spread everywhere, the football team of the film was giving the message of being united as the team member for making the nation strong and prosperous in real sense.
Boone calls his team winners not because they win the match, but because they win to remove racial hostility from their minds. ‘I am not gonna talk to you tonight about winnin’ and losin’. You’re already winners ‘cause you didn’t kill each other up at camp’(Remember the Titans)
The characters of Boone and Yoast are crucial in the film. They are like motivational leaders. Motivation or inspiration is one of the major factors. As described by Borland, Burton and Kane (p. 215), coaches motivate effort levels, facilitate appropriate performance strategies, and ensure the sharing of member knowledge and development of their skills.’ They further say, ‘Effective team leaders are also not intimidated by high-performing contributors and embrace their role as the developer of their members’ (Borland, Burton and Kane, 215). They are shown as doing the job of establishing strong team spirit among the team members and motivating them by paying their attention on football rather than racial issues. The effective leadership is necessary everywhere for building a strong team and bringing awareness team spirit, group dynamics.
Boone is a perfect leader as described by Murray. Murray comments on the great leadership, ‘Great leaders exhibit a paradoxical mix of arrogance and humility’ (Voight, 122). He further says, ‘the leaders must be arrogant enough to believe they are worth following, but humble enough to know that others may have a better sense of the direction they should take’ (Voigt, 122). Boone sometime is shown arrogant but at the same time he cares his team members regardless of their race.
Main character Boone has an extraordinary role to play in the film. Boon is under the pressure of firing from the position of the coach if his team loses even a single game. He also had a great challenge to bring together black and white team players together, who were previous the fierce rivals of each other. Bringing the rivals together to form a strong team was really a very tough job. Under the constant threat and challenges, Boone has to show his capacity as an efficient coach. He is successful in his herculean task and he is supported by the previous white coach Yoast. He constantly motivates his team to be stronger and to be perfect. The following lines of Boon’s speech are very motivational.
“You got anger, that’s good you’re gonna need it, you got aggression that’s even better you’re gonna need that, too. But any little two year old child can throw a fit! Football is about controlling that anger, harnessing that aggression into a team efforts to achieve perfection” (Remember the Titans)
The above speech reflects Boon’s personality as a charismatic leader, who inspired his team members through his motivational speeches. For Boone, this team members are more than team members. He has established a relationship with them. The relationship with the players and athletes needs to developed in some leadership (Westerbeek &Smith, 94)
The film is based on the true story of American coach Herman Boon. But while directing the film, the movie many times moves away from the historical facts. First of all the reel character of Boon is different from his real character. The director many time has tried to exaggerate in portraying his character and making him ideal one. The character of Boon was not that much appreciated by the formal team players of Titans. On the contrary, he was very rude and due to him rudeness, many player had quit the team. Moreover, the film depicts the racial issues of the contemporary America in a much exaggerated manner. Couple of scenes of the film are fictional and not at all associated with the real story; for example, the scene where Petey was refused the service in the restaurant. Coach Yoast’s daughter is portrayed as a diehard fan of football. But in actual, she was not that much enthusiastic about football. It is also shown in the film that she was the only daughter of Yoast. In reality Yoast had other three children as well. In the film it is shown that a brick was thrown by someone towards the window of Boon and he comes out with his gun. In reality, it was not the brick but it was the toilet and Coach Boon never had a gun. Probably, the director here wants to enhance the cinematographic effect of the film and so he shows Boon with the gun.
Overall the film is the best example for management studies. It focuses on the major management theories and leadership and group dynamics are the major management principle on which the film is based.
Reference
Borland, John. Burton, Laura. & Kane, Gregory. Sports Leadership in the 21st Century. N.p: Jones and Bartlett Publisher, n.d. 215. Web. 12 July 2015 https://books.google.co.in/books?isbn=1449690874
Remember the Titans. Dir. Boaz Yakin, Perf. Denzel Washington and Will Patton. 2000. Remember the Titan Full Movie. Dadas Hraefc, 26 May 2015. Web. 12 July 2015. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGZBblF3HoY>.
Westerbeek, Hans, and Smith, Aaron. Business Leadership and the Lesson from Sport. N.p: Palgrave Macmillan Publication, n.d. 94. Web. 12 July 2015. https://books.google.co.in/books?isbn=0230524419
Voight, Mike. The Sports Leadership Playbook: Principles and Techniques for Coaches and Captains. N.p.: McFarland Publication, n.d. 122. Web. 12 July 2015. https://books.google.co.in/books?isbn=1476615446
