Welcome back to Junkfood Cinema; lords of the gridiron…or at least the waffle iron. Strap on your helmet and conceal any benefits you received from agents during college because you have just been drafted to the NFL; the Nefarious Film Lovers…League. Ok, so it’s the NFLL, shut up! Every week we tackle a bad movie to the roaring delight of over eight people. And we don’t just tackle the movie, we tackle it like we’re Ray Lewis with a playoff game on the line and the ref’s just been stricken with blindness. But then, just before the internet starts throwing penalty flags at us, we enter free agency, join up with the film, and use our unabashed love for it to help this underdog win a championship of warped film appreciation. Finally, after months of heated debate that ultimately muddied the issue and pushed us closer to the edge of complete anarchy…the NFL lockout is over. We can finally stop troubling ourselves with petty nuisances like defaulting on our national debts and get back to what really matters: overpaid sweaty guys knocking the snot out of each other. In honor of this jubilant occasion, I decided to run an all-out blitz on a film from  2000 whose premise eerily mirrors recent events. This week’s play: The Replacements

Continuing his quest to become the Cary Grant of his time, George Clooney directs and stars in a quaint throwback to the screwball comedies of the golden age of cinema, the aptly named Leatherheads.

Leatherheads chronicles the early days of the NFL. Most importantly, it takes place in the midst of prohibition. But you don’t need to worry about prohibition now. Even if it’s illegal for the characters in the movie to drink, that doesn’t mean that you can’t.

Set at the dawn of pro football in the 1920s, Leatherheads is a spirited affair that isn’t quite a football movie, but more of a romantic comedy that uses football as a backdrop. But with a solid cast and a little flair, it just might be worth a ticket.

Since you aren’t watching football on TV, you might as well talk about football movies here…

George Clooney has had some luck with cheeky romantic comedies — but can it work when it is set against the backdrop of pro football in the 1920s?

Since Jake Gyllenhaal is now in line to star as womanizing football Hall of Famer Joe Namath in an upcoming biopic, we’ve decided to make a few pitches to Hollywood for some other biopics that need makin’.