At first, backup quarterback Jonathan “Mox” Moxom (James Van Der Beek) is nowhere close to being a star athlete. Perfectly content to stay on the bench, he has no time for coach Kilmer’s (Jon Voight) win-at-all-cost strategies. But when the starting quarterback (Paul Walker) is injured, Mox is in the game and confronting the pressures and temptations of gridiron glory. Soon everyone will realize there’s not just a new star quarterback in town, there’s a new kind of hero.

For thoughts on Varsity Blues, please check out our discussion on The Video Attic:

[youtube https://youtu.be/iKQbOQ9vcfQ?si=lIH_gvbGLQnOqOZV&t=2207]

Video Quality

Varsity Blues makes its 4K UHD Blu-Ray debut with a decent 2160p/Dolby Vision transfer that has been newly remastered from the Original Camera Negative. This new release easily bests the previous release, but some deficiencies are keeping this from being a standout release. The previous Paramount Blu-Ray release from 15 years ago, also included in this release for the special features, has always been considered a lackluster disc. Thankfully, this new 4K UHD Blu-Ray retains a good deal of the natural film grain which unlocks some pleasing texture and detail within the transfer. For the first time on home entertainment, you can clearly see specific facets of the uniforms, production design, and landscapes that ground you in this small town.

When the transfer is at its best, the clarity of the transfer gives you a significant amount of facial detail, allowing things to appear more textured and natural than ever before. There is also some nice depth on display which makes the football field feel more immense and intimidating. The application of Dolby Vision to this presentation yields some great results. The community provides some deep, complex colors throughout. The picture maintains a strong amount of detail in darker environments and nighttime scenes. Highlights are much more formidable and stable without veering into blooming. Where the transfer falters is in the occasionally shoddy encoding, such as in the opening credits when the Scott Caan character is leaving his house to jump in the back of the truck. The bitrate plummets and the picture looks atrocious. Further instances are limited in scope, but this has become a recurring problem with Paramount that they need to get under control. There does not appear to be any lingering damage, and outside of the sporadic encoding issues, the transfer is a really nice one.

Audio Quality

The 4K UHD Blu-Ray does not get an audio upgrade to go with the video as we are provided with a perfectly fine Dolby TrueHD 5.1 audio track. One of the most prominent elements of the track is the soundtrack filled with songs from the era, and each track permeates the room with strong fidelity. The film is not the most distinct when it comes to conjuring environmental effects in the surround channels, but the elements that are there work well. All of the sounds in the mix seem natural if not underutilized. Dialogue comes through clearly without any sound effects or the music overshadowing important information. The hard-hitting football moments wake up the track a bit in the low end. While a new Atmos track would have been nice, Paramount has delivered a good audio track for this one. There are optional English, English SDH, and French subtitles provided.

Special Features

Audio Commentary: Director Brian Robbins and Producers Tova Laiter and Mike Tollin provide a commentary track in which they discuss their original reasons for passing on the film, shifting the tone of the film from the original concept, the performances from the ensemble, the importance of the score, how the “R” rating serviced the film, the turn from Jon Voight, and more.

Football Is A Way Of Life – The Making of Varsity Blues: An 18-minute archival featurette that takes a look at the origins of the idea for the narrative, how it was developed over many drafts, the decision to cast certain performers, the direction of Brian Robbins, the Texas football dynamic, the location shooting, and much more that is very worthwhile.

Two-A-Days – The Ellis Way: An eight-minute look at the preparations that went into getting the performers ready to believably portray football players and how they pulled off certain scenes.

QB Game Analysis: A 15-minute piece with Coach Mark Ellis and NFL quarterback and former Texas high school QB Josh McCown in which they share their thoughts on the film, how it handled the football culture and more.

Billy Bob with No Bacon: A nearly five-minute featurette with actor Ron Lester reflecting on his life since filming Varsity Blues.

Theatrical Trailer: The two-and-a-half-minute trailer is provided here.

Final Thoughts

Varsity Blues is far from the best football movie that has ever been crafted, but many memorable moments have permeated pop culture – so it has something going for it. The screenplay is a bit too simple and sophomoric to glean any real insight into the culture, yet the charisma of the performers makes it a light, entertaining watch. If you want something with some dramatic weight, check out Friday Night Lights, but this is passable for cinematic junk food. Paramount Home Entertainment has released a 4K UHD Blu-Ray which offers a mixed bag of an A/V presentation and its original legacy special features. If you are a fan of this one in the slightest, this is probably worth the upgrade.

Varsity Blues is currently available to purchase on 4K UHD Blu-Ray and Digital.

Note: Images presented in this review are not reflective of the image quality of the 4K UHD Blu-Ray.

Disclaimer: Paramount Home Entertainment has supplied a copy of this disc free of charge for review purposes. All opinions in this review are the honest reactions of the author.