Tuesday 24 March 2009

Best Sports Films

With the release of Damned United this Friday, which threatens to be the greatest football film ever (although lets face it, that wouldn't be too hard) I thought I would combine two of man's favorite things; sport and lists.


5. Field of Dreams (Baseball)
"If you build it, he will come. "
A story about a man, who builds a baseball field in his farm. The plot sounds daft, and really it is. However this is mainly a story about relationships, that of a father and son. By doing this it plays every right note and comes to a lovely conclusion.

4. Children of Glory (Water Polo)
"Russians go home"
In 1956, Hungarian had the greatest water polo team in the world, unfortunately the Russians beat them as they control the refs. However they cannot do this at the Olympics and the team set about training for the biggest tournament of their lives. But the Hungarian revolution gets in the way and this is more a film about that than the polo, which really acts as book ends for the film. If the conclusion to this film doesn't have you shouting "Russik go home" at the end then you are either a) heartless or b) a commie

3. Cool Runnings (Bobsledding)
"Are you dead man? No I gotta finish the race"
Yeah it's cheesy, but it's fun god dam it. I have watched it many a time and they still don't win :(

2.Any Given Sunday (American Football)
"On any given Sunday you're gonna win or you're gonna lose. The point is - can you win or lose like a man? "
Ok I'm putting this in here just for Al Pacino's speech. But it's really good speech. The rest of the film is good as well though. Due to it's stop start nature, American footall leads itself to film rather well.

1. This Sporting Life (Rugby League)
"We don't have stars in this game, that's football"
Hands down the greatest sports film ever. The rugby scenes are truely brilliant, you can feel the game as it is, well was, hard, fast and brutal but at the same time skillful. Yet the real story here is how the game is escapism from life of the working class.