If you're looking for a film with a happy tone, you'd better go see the Atlantis reissue. O is definitely a dark, & at some times, an evenly dramatic film.
Peiffer (that's probably not the right spelling ), playing Odin James was very good as both a bright athlete & a jealous lover (which he later turns into). Stiles, O's girlfriend, plays her role well, although it's not much of a stretch for her to play a moody teen. Harnett, although, who plays O's teammate & the coach's son, is too dark in the role of the one who plans to remove the star athlete from his father's affection. He seems overly evil and viscious compared to even the people that he uses to break up O.
The movie is a well-made adaptation of Shakespeare's Othello, but Harnett's dark performance drags the movie down further and further as it goes, eventually letting Harnett forget the fact that his jealousy is over Basketball, and lets Peiffer get too wrapped up in the love triangle that Harnett puts him in to remember that he was in it for the game at the film's beginning.

So, while the movie is a good dramatic film, I felt that it spirals into darkness too quickly, with Harnett changing the movie's tone too quickly. Go see it if you're tired of the "Hollywood Happy" movies.