Article: 'Friday Night Lights': Can't live with football, can't live without it

A nearly new high school football coach expected to win the state championship suddenly finds himself facing an impossible task when he loses his star running back.

That's a pretty good hook for a piece of football fiction. It's an even better hook for a fact-based film like "Friday Night Lights."

"Friday Night Lights" is about football but, more importantly, it's about football players - and even more importantly, it's about Texas, a state where not much matters besides football.

It opens with a wide-angle shot of gray clouds moving over a stark landscape bisected by a long straight road - a sight familiar to anyone who's spent time in west Texas. It climaxes at the Astrodome, where Odessa ...

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