Movies and Sports - the Perfect Action Adventure Combination

Movies create a place of imaginary play. A place where adventure, romance, even a shiver of terror becomes real because we humans have a great capacity to empathize. A wonderful movie opens a door to a brief world where we can experience the marvelous things our mundane lives might lack.

Sporting events create a similar circumstance. We're not just watching the game, we're down on that field or in the ring or on the court with the players. Our brains allow us to sweat along with them, feel the ball in our hand, and know the rush of honest competition. Our minds sympathize with defeat and celebrate triumph.

Now if we combine these two mediums - movies and sports - we score one heck of an amazing thrill ride. A sports movie doubles our chance to participate. A great sports film enhances the game by bringing us right inside the action. It illuminates the motives of the players. Sports movies allow us to experience historic competitors and heroes - both famous and infamous - that we'll never get to see live.

Listed below are the films I consider my top 5 sports movies. For me, these films express the pleasure of play and the delight of donning a uniform. But mostly these sports movies replicate that special instant when you just know your mental and physical training have culminated into a perfect athletic moment.

Tin Cup (1996) Color; 135 Minutes
Directed by Ron Shelton. Written by John Norville and Ron Shelton. Starring Kevin Costner as Roy "Tin Cup" McAvoy, Rene Russo as Dr. Molly Griswold, Cheech Marin as Romeo Posar, Don Johnson as David Simms. Good follow through of your swing is an essential part of the game of golf. The talented though undisciplined golfer Roy "Tin Cup" McAvoy (Kevin Costner) finds his life in a rut because he lacks that follow through. That is, until he meets his catalyst for change, the delicious and somewhat scattered therapist, Molly Griswold (Rene Russo). McAvoy's quest for his lady fair is complicated by the fact that she's dating his old golf rival, David Simms, wickedly portrayed by Don Johnson. This film combines the best aspects of a romantic comedy with sports action because the script makes perfect use of the rules and play of golf as metaphor. Anybody who has ever swung a golf club understands that the balance of mind and body is essential to success, on and off the course.

Eight Men Out (1988) Color; 120 minutes
Written for the screen and Directed by John Sayles. Based on the book by Eliot Asinof. Starring John Cusack as George "Buck" Weaver, Christopher Lloyd as "Sleepy" Bill Burns, John Mahoney as William "Kid" Gleason, David Strathairn as Eddie Cicotte, D.B. Sweeney as "Shoeless" Joe Jackson. Written for the screen and directed by the remarkable filmmaker John Sayles, Eight Men Out is not just one of the best sports films ever made but simply one of the best movies ever made. The use of steroids is not the first scandal to tarnish the purity of the great American pastime. This film recounts the story of the eight Chicago White Sox players (or Black Sox players as they were dubbed) who allegedly threw the 1919 World Series. This sports film uses a perfect balance of on and off field action to tell the story of how one of the most sanctified aspects of American culture, baseball, is not immune to smarmy politics and monetary corruption. The misty imagery and somewhat exaggerated old-timey dialogue allows us to travel back in time to an era when baseball was played during the day and the only things that were airborne were fly balls and home runs.

The Hustler (1961) B&W; 135 minutes
Produced and Directed by Robert Rossen. Screenplay by Sidney Carroll and Robert Rossen. Novel by Walter S. Tevis. Starring Paul Newman as "Fast" Eddie Felson, Piper Laurie as Sarah Packard, George C. Scott as Bert Gordon, Jackie Gleason as Minnesota Fats. The great thing about the sport of pool is that it's not confined to athletes of a muscular body type. Anybody can play this game - fat or skinny, tall, short. Yet it still requires well-honed physical and mental skills. The Hustler follows the exploits of a young, arrogant pool player named Eddie Felson, flawlessly performed by Paul Newman. Felson is determined to beat the man at the top, Minnesota Fats, played by the perfectly cast Jackie Gleason (The Honeymooners), himself an expert pool player. But Felson's overconfidence gets in the way of his dream, especially after he falls in with the lizard-like bankroller Bert Gordon (George C. Scott). One of this film's greatest assets is how it so easily moves between moments of cool and sleaze. Another is its emphasis on the fact that an athlete's success is as much based on strength of heart as it is on the control of muscles.

A League of Their Own (1992) Color; 130 minutes
Directed by Penny Marshall. Story by Kim Wilson & Kelly Candaele. Screenplay by Lowell Ganz & Babaloo Mandel. Starring Tom Hanks as Jimmy Dugan, Geena Davis as Dottie Hinson, Madonna as Mae Mordabito, Lori Petty as Kit Keller, David Strathairn as Ira Lowenstein. Chronicles the short lived and nearly forgotten All-American Girls Professional Baseball League which played during World War II. Both male and female Americans have a great passion for baseball - playing the game as well as watching. The story of these women athletes proves this. The screenplay uses a perfect mix of humor and drama to illustrate the prejudice, tribulations and triumphs the AAGPBL baseball players experienced. The actors' genuine portrayals frankly express what happens when more than proficient women step onto the field of what is considered the exclusive domain of men. Penny Marshall's excellent directing and her desire to bring this story to the big screen granted the players of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League what all talented people desire and deserve - acknowledgment and respect. And yes, this is the movie that spawned the now legendary line, "There's no crying in baseball!"

The Natural (1984) Color; 144 minutes (Director's Cut)
Directed by Barry Levinson. Screenplay by Roger Towne and Phil Dusenberry. From the novel by Bernard Malamud. Starring Robert Redford as Roy Hobbs, Glenn Close as Iris Gaines, Kim Basinger as Memo Paris, Richard Farnsworth as Red Blow and Darren McGavin as Gus Sands. If Hollywood celebrities are America's royalty then our sports figures are knight-like champions. An athlete's fame can be both a blessing and curse. This concept is poetically expressed in what I consider the ultimate movie about baseball. Robert Redford plays Roy Hobbs, a talented young baseball player whose athletic career is interrupted by a bizarre and tragic event. Many years later, determined to fulfill his dream, he returns to the Majors. He is perhaps a little older than the average player but he can still belt them out of the park. As with all champions on a quest, greedy forces threaten to reduce his dream to ashes. Unpretentious dialogue, glistening imagery and perfect sound editing merge to express on film what is most elegant about the game played on a diamond with a, technically, infinite field of play. If you love the crack of the bat and the arc of the ball as flies toward the heavens, then you'll identify with Redford's character when he says, "God, I love baseball."