By The Spear Staff
Spear Speaks is a new series where The Spear’s reporters and editors answer a question related to the world of sports. For the inaugural edition, what is each writer’s favorite sports film?
GO!
Austin: Golf doesn’t typically make for the most exciting sport to base fiction on, but Caddyshack is the quintessential sports comedy. The golf course is the ultimate boys-club, and this movie showcases the absolute hilarity that can come from it. Come on, watch this movie and count how many times you’ll laugh out loud. Every time Rodney Dangerfield is on-screen, you won’t be able to contain yourself. And this film contains Bill Murray in easily his funniest role as he tries — and fails — repeatedly to catch that gopher. Even better, he apparently improvised all of his lines. Caddyshack is a classic and it should be the favorites of all sports fans with a twisted sense of humor.
Jessica: One of my top favorite sports movies is The Fighter with Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale. I grew up watching boxing movies because my dad is a trained boxer but had to quit because of an injury/ personal struggles. Wahlberg’s performance portraying welterweight boxer Micky Ward is authentic and real. His crack addict retired boxer half-brother turned coach Dicky Eklund played by Christian Bale shows the audience his raw talent of flawlessly getting into character and sticking to it. Living in impoverished Lowell, Massachusetts with dreams of becoming a boxing champion, Ward also fights his own personal issues with a dead-end job, training on the streets just like Rocky in preparation for the big fight at the end. I always love a good movie that involves a turn-around story of fighting hard battles to becoming the best athlete they can be. I am a big fan of a thick Massachusetts accent and everyone’s performance is great. It won numerous Academy Awards. Watch it if you haven’t.
Jarra: Space Jam 100%. I’m the furthest thing from a movie nerd, but that movie was basically another legal guardian. Classic cartoon characters. NBA icons. Diminutive alien henchmen who turn into humongous, partially-reptilian basketball beasts. The movie had everything younger me could want in a movie. Daffy Duck and Bill Murray each put on great performances, but Charles Barkley was possibly my favorite part of Space Jam. The “Basketball Jones” scene — with Sir Charles getting bullied off the court by high schoolers, and promising to God he’d “never date Madonna again” — is iconic. One piece of criticism I have with Space Jam though is the awful officiating performance by Marvin the Martian. I’m all for letting players play, but some of the contact the ref was allowing could’ve constituted literal attempted murder. Foghorn Leghorn literally got flame-broiled to ashes by Pound’s (the green guy’s) breath, and Wile E. Coyote used explosives to stop a Bupkus (the purple guy) drive to the basket. Despite little critical acclaim (43% Rotten Tomatoes), you need to watch this movie at least once in your lifetime.
Kenia: My favorite Sport movie is “The Sandlot” produced by Dale De La Torre, William S. Gilmore in 1993. The movie begins with Scotty Small moving to a new neighborhood. Small is interested in learning how to play baseball but he’s not necessarily the best at sport. However, “Benny The Jet “ Rodriguez is not willing to let him give up on himself. He invites him on an adventure that will soon change his life. Throughout the movie you get to see the progress of smalls and the team in general as well as the conflicts they come across with other local teams. Growing up this was my favorite movie because even though I didn’t know much about baseball I felt like this movie taught me the basics of baseball.It is almost impossible to ignore that Rodriguez was the best player of the team. He was always willing to teach and coach the rest. In the movie Rodriguez will often bring up the legendary baseball figure Babe Ruth. We get to see how Rodriguez works his way into becoming a great athlete. This is the perfect movie to watch with your family as it creates inspiration and motivation amongst the younger ones.
Nick: This is such a tough question because I feel like there are many directions to go here. Since it’s the 40-year anniversary of the U.S. Men’s Olympic gold medal, I’ll go with Miracle (2004). It’s based on a true story, and even though I’ve seen it countless times it gives me goosebumps every time I watch it. Now I’ll admit, I’m a little biased because I tend to lean in the hockey direction. With that said, it brings one of the greatest American sports moments to life. It’s a movie about a game played 40 years ago, yet I’m still on the edge of my seat, every single time. Who doesn’t love that Herb Brooks locker room speech to get the boys going? Truly legendary.
Gio: I personally do not watch many movies. If I had to choose my favorite sports movie, it would have to be Remember The Titans. I know, super cliche. However, watching this movie for the first time at a young age blew my mind. I felt every type of emotion while watching that movie. From laughing to crying and every feeling in between. Isn’t that what makes a good movie? Denzel Washington plays the role of Herman Boone. A high school football coach from North Carolina who takes the Helm of a new school called T.C Williams. Except this school was one of the first to let white and black students share the same school. Virginia was trying to end segregation and felt that making T.C Williams would help with that. The football team is obviously dysfunctional at first. However, Boone teaches these young men that they are on the same team on the football field. No matter the color of their skin. If you have never seen this gem from the year 2000, I would highly recommend it.
Derrick: My favorite movie is Moneyball, (2011). I may be a little biased because I am an A’s fan. But, I saw my favorite team on the silver screen. I read the book about the 2002 Oakland Athletics who went on a then record 20 game winning streak. Of course, they got eliminated in the ALDS by the Minnesota Twins. However, I have been a big supporter of Billy Beane who is the A’s Vice President of Baseball Operations. This movie hit home because I remember watching all the players who were portrayed. Miguel Tejada, Barry Zito, Scott Hatteberg, Tim Hudson, David Justice, and Chad Bradford just to name a few. The A’s were an underdog team to start that season after losing all three of their superstars in the previous off season, (Jason Giambi, Jason Isringhausen, Johnny Damon). This movie did get nominated for an Academy Award which should be an automatic No. 1 seed.
Max: My favorite sports movie of all time is Goon. My best guess is that only hockey players and fans know about this movie because it did not receive any national media attention. This is a movie that is based on a true story about Doug Glatt (that was the name of the main character in the film not the actual name) on how he became a semi-professional hockey player just on his fighting ability. Throughout the film, Glatt is depicted as someone who isn’t very smart but can fight. Once a coach in his hometown caught wind of a fight during a game he attended he wanted him on the team. The fight was with a player that ended up jumping over the glass during play and Glatt kicked his butt. From that point forward Glatt ended up on the team and the coach did his best to teach him how to skate. Now Glatt was having a lot of success and the coach had a brother-in-law who was coaching a minor league team with a failed top prospect. The prospect, Xavier LaFlamme, was a second overall pick who by all accounts was a superstar in the making. After sustaining a “Grade four concussion” (what the movie described his injury to be) LaFlamme was not the same. Once sent down he got with the wrong people. Glatt was sent to that team to protect LaFlamme and show him that he can still turn his life and his game around. As Glatt gets closer with the whole team LaFlamme and his ego slowly started to come around to liking everyone. Glatt also was able to push the struggling team, The Halifax Highlanders, from dead last to a playoff team. The climax is when Glatt is forced to fight Ross Rhea, a grizzled vet in his retirement season. Rhea was the idol of Glatt before and even during his playing time. Glatt modeled his hockey fighting style off of him. Rhea also happened to be the guy that gave LaFlamme his concussion. In the final game of the season, where the winner goes to the playoffs, Glatt and Rhea face off in an all-time classic bloody hockey fight. After that LaFlamme takes it upon himself to get his team in the lead by scoring a hat trick after being down 2-0. With budget low on this movie, it almost made it more real. With even some big cast members due to the relationships of Jay Baruchel, who made the movie, overall Goon is a classic hockey movie that everyone who is into sports should watch.
Kellen: My favorite sports film of all time is The Sandlot. The plot is something many other films tried to duplicate but could never match up to the original. Classic summer film about a few teenagers who played baseball in the 60s. The main character, “Smalls”, used his step-dad’s baseball signed by Babe Ruth in a pickup game with his friends. The team’s catcher “Ham” hit that ball over the fence where the beast rests. They tried several tactics to get the ball until Benny “The Jet” Rodriguez hopped to fence himself to go face to face with the beast.
Alex: My favorite sports movie is Dodgeball. I am more of a fan of comedy movies so this one is right up my alley. The movie has all the aspects of a sports movie as the owner of a small gym attempts to keep his business running by winning a dodgeball tournament as the underdog. Dodgeball is a truly stupid movie, but it optimizes the kind of comedy that I have always enjoyed while adding in sports. I am not surprised a movie like this would receive such low ratings from fans, but I see it as more of an escape from the normal feel-good sports film.
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