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95 minutes. Rated PG-13 for language, sexuality.

STARRING: Eva Pigford (Vanessa), Anthony Mackie (Tech), Wayne Brady (Vaughn), Wesley Jonathan (Noah Cruise), Kristen Wilson (Nikki), Li’l J J (Up), Hot Sauce (Jewelz) and Alecia Fears (Eboni).

Every once a long while, a sports film comes along that reaffirms the spirituality of pure athletic competition, inspires our youth to giving at least one effort their best shot, and reminds us all of the value of honesty, perseverance, trust, and teamwork — all while being stylish, entertaining, well-acted, and innovative.

Crossover is not that film. Not by an urban Detroit mile (or seven — even eight).

If you saw that line coming, there will be little in Crossover that surprises you either; and if I caught you off guard, this film might, too, in spite of my criticisms. So there’s the key for interpreting this review.

Wayne Brady stars as Vaughn, a former Detroit sports agent who’s finally made it big, in his small Detroit-ish way. He organizes (and makes book for, naturally) a series of “underground” basketball games. Each of the five winning team members take home two grand. The losing five take one grand per. Vaughn gets the lion’s share.

Enter, in a promising (if ultimately disappointing) way, Noah (Wesley Jonathan) and Tech (Anthony Mackie), the hoops-loving pro-wannabe Good Boy and Bad Boy Buds With a History. Noah’s planning to ride his UCLA scholarship all the way to med school, while Tech slaves away to polish off his GED. It’s a long row to hoe, since he has real trouble adding $125 and $35 in his head.

But why bother describing anything else about the plot? Because this is the real problem with Tech. He just can’t figure anything out. Not long after, Tech bemoans the fact that he has no idea how he’ll manage to finance two plane tickets to LA — despite the fact that he holds down a regular job, has just paid off his mom’s outstanding light bill, and is standing there with over a thousand dollars in his pocket. Do they just grow ‘em stupid in Detroit?

No, they don’t. They just grow ‘em stupid in Crossover, a movie at which even friendly audiences will howl with derisive laughter. It’s the kind of movie in which Brady’s love interest exists purely as an expository pawn. It’s the kind of movie in which characters make introductions for other characters to whom they haven’t even been introduced yet. It’s the kind of movie in which DJs mix vaguely distant elevator music, in which packed dance clubs allow whispered dance-floor conversations, in which crowds of people move as they’re playing Red Light, Green Light or Amoeba. It’s the kind of movie in which action is driven by lines like, “Let me show you something over here...” It’s Scooby-Doo meets BET, with Velma grinding her hee-hoo up against Shaggy’s zipper, and a soundtrack that sounds like it was lifted from a Flint community theatre version of Love Boat, circa 1977. You’ve got to groan, wondering how much money Brady took to utter the line, “The NBA is every black boy’s dream.” Irony, schmirony. This is just bad, bad, bad.

But in its pathetically earnest way, the movie is rather entertaining. Noah’s cheerfully grinning, naive face will have you reflecting that a comedy starring Sylvester Stallone and Michael Keaton, in which they struggle to figure out which of them actually fathered Wesley Jonathan, might actually be pretty amusing. (Too bad Jonathan’s career is probably hotter than Stallone’s or Keaton’s.) The basketball scenes will leave you enthralled, trying to figure out where the fifth man on Tech’s team keeps going to — the one who looks more like the Michelin Man than a ballplayer. And the one truly bright note in this affair — Little JJ as Tech’s young protégé “Up” — will make you long for a movie truly worth this young man’s talents.

So what was director Preston A. Whitmore aiming for with this mess? Stay-in-school Message Tragedy, hip-hoop style. In Brady’s convictionless words, “Greek meets Urban.”

So much for legendary, though; and those with any street sense will likely cross over to the other side. This movie makes Glory Road look like The Odyssey. Remember the Titans? Rent that one (or the profane, stirring Blue Chips, even) for the tenth time, and give this one a no-look Hoosier pass.

For more information on Greg Wright, including his email address, check out his Blogger profile page.