The Longshots (2008)

Image credit: Tracy Bennett

NOT SO LIMP Director Fred Durst quarterbacks a surprisingly OK inspirational sports story in The Longshots (Ice Cube and Keke Palmerm, pictured)

The most surprising thing about the inspirational sports movie The Longshots is not that there isn't already an inspirational sports movie with that exact name. The big shock is that the director is Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst — and he doesn't do half bad. Yes, the (true) story he's working with — an unpopular girl (Keke Palmer), coached by her reformed ne'er-do-well uncle (Ice Cube), becomes a star middle-school quarterback — is hopelessly clichéd. And there's no forgiving Durst for the touchdown dance set to ''Whoomp! (There It Is).'' But he conveys a real feel for the depressed factory-town setting and elicits better-than-usual work out of Cube. B-