Thursday, March 03, 2005
"Wanna have a catch?"
The Sports Guy is holding a contest to choose his new intern. He asked his 17 remaining applicants what their favorite Sports Movie is, and not one of them said FIELD OF DREAMS!!!
That's both remarkable and absurd. Field of Dreams is hands down my favorite sports movie of all time, it's my favorite any movie of all time, and to read people giving answers like "Rounders," "The Big Lebowksi," and "Major League" is proposterous.
Those are are all good movies, I own Rounders, The Big Lebowski is my second favorite movie of all time, and I like all the Major League movies...even Back to the Minors, but they are not great sports movies. I would put Rounders in the same category as The Cincinnati Kid, The Hustler and The Color of Money. And if you're going to call The Big Lewbowski a sports movie, well, then you better be ready call King Pin a sports movie too.
So what does a great sports movie need?
First, sports needs to be the context of the movie, not what the movie is about. There needs to be a good human story behind it. It can't be all games and scores.
It needs to be a drama to be a great sports movie. Caddyshack is hilarious, but it's not a great sports movie.
It needs to be void of sappiness, cliche, or the way too cheesey ending, even if the true story fascilitates a cheesey ending, the movie needs to avoid cheeseing it up. But at the same time it needs to hit home with the viewer. The ending of Field of Dreams is a perfect example. It carries significant emotional weight, but it doesn't go overboard with the sentiment the last scene contains. It is uses one sentence, "Hey, Dad... ya wanna have a catch?" That's it. And you get it and feel it.
It needs to about a team sport. There is a reason why team sports are the most popular and there is a reason why they make the best sports movies. People can relate to them, even if a person didn't play any sports, they can relate to the camaraderie.
If I was Bill Simmons, I would scrap all those candidates and start over.
I'm not a huge fan of sports movies as a genre, mostly because the movies always seem to fuck up some part of the sport, do something wrong, use actors who look nothing like athletes. Also, Hollywood tends to be too sentimental about those kinds of stories.
So that's my take on that.
Until about 15 minutes.
That's both remarkable and absurd. Field of Dreams is hands down my favorite sports movie of all time, it's my favorite any movie of all time, and to read people giving answers like "Rounders," "The Big Lebowksi," and "Major League" is proposterous.
Those are are all good movies, I own Rounders, The Big Lebowski is my second favorite movie of all time, and I like all the Major League movies...even Back to the Minors, but they are not great sports movies. I would put Rounders in the same category as The Cincinnati Kid, The Hustler and The Color of Money. And if you're going to call The Big Lewbowski a sports movie, well, then you better be ready call King Pin a sports movie too.
So what does a great sports movie need?
First, sports needs to be the context of the movie, not what the movie is about. There needs to be a good human story behind it. It can't be all games and scores.
It needs to be a drama to be a great sports movie. Caddyshack is hilarious, but it's not a great sports movie.
It needs to be void of sappiness, cliche, or the way too cheesey ending, even if the true story fascilitates a cheesey ending, the movie needs to avoid cheeseing it up. But at the same time it needs to hit home with the viewer. The ending of Field of Dreams is a perfect example. It carries significant emotional weight, but it doesn't go overboard with the sentiment the last scene contains. It is uses one sentence, "Hey, Dad... ya wanna have a catch?" That's it. And you get it and feel it.
It needs to about a team sport. There is a reason why team sports are the most popular and there is a reason why they make the best sports movies. People can relate to them, even if a person didn't play any sports, they can relate to the camaraderie.
If I was Bill Simmons, I would scrap all those candidates and start over.
I'm not a huge fan of sports movies as a genre, mostly because the movies always seem to fuck up some part of the sport, do something wrong, use actors who look nothing like athletes. Also, Hollywood tends to be too sentimental about those kinds of stories.
So that's my take on that.
Until about 15 minutes.
