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This Sports Movie Book
Is a Must for Film Buffs
By STAN ISAACS
of TheColumnists.com
STAN ISAACS
OUT OF LEFT FIELD
ALL YOU EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT SPORTS MOVIES
This Sports Movie Book
Is a Must for Film Buffs
By STAN ISAACS
of TheColumnists.com
The title of this just-published book is “The Ultimate Book of Sports Movies” ($19.95, Running Press) And that’s what it is. I recommend it as a book anybody interested in sports and movies must have. It is, in its way, worthy of a place next to the “Baseball Encyclopedia” as the authoritative book on the subject.
Ray Didinger and Glen Macnow, two Philadelphia guys, not only have listed their 100 greatest sports films of all time (arguments galore can come out of that feature) but have provided encyclopedic bits of background on the making of the films, on the actors, on odd facts about movies.
Some of the supplementary features are “Great scenes in non-sports movies;” “Actors as athletes;” “Athletes who could (and who could not) act;” “All-time movie baseball and football teams;” “Sports Flicks for Kids;” “Best Lines”; and “The Worst Sports Movies.”
Here is some terrific background on the making of “The Hustler:”
Jackie Gleason was already a high-level pool shooter when he was cast as Minnesota Fats in the movie. Paul Newman moved a table into his upper East Side apartment and took daily lessons from pool great Willie Mosconi. He improved to the point where he could beat most neighborhood pool shooters. He grew so confident that one afternoon during the filming he challenged Gleason to a game of nine-ball with a friendly $1 wager.
Newman won, so they played again. Newman won another dollar. And then another. And then, full of bravado, Newman challenged Gleason to one more game-this time for $100. “He whipped my ass,” Newman later recalled. “He hustled me. He was looking down my throat the whole time.” Newman paid off his debt the next day-entirely in pennies.
For the final shot in “Field of Dreams,” (No. 11) an aerial view of cars driving to the Iowa farm, more than 1,500 locals volunteered to drive. Traffic got so heavy, most of the cars weren’t moving. Director Phil Robinson told people to flash their high beams on and off, creating the appearance of traffic.
Glenn Close, who was nominated for an Oscar as “Best supporting actress” for “The Natural” was an avid softball player in her youth. She passed time on the set playing pepper with the guys…Susan Sarandon won her role in “Bull Durham” by showing up for her audition in a sexy red-and-white dress…Cameraman James Wong Howe filmed the final bout in “Body and Soul” on roller skates, moving in a tight circle around the two fighters with a hand-held camera.
Ronald Reagan almost didn’t get to play “George Gipp” in “Knute Rockne: All American” (No. 27). Producer Hal Wallis considered William Holden, John Wayne, Robert Young and Robert Cummings for the role. Reagan made such a passionate pitch for the role, Wallis hired him. Pat O’Brien, who played Rockne, liked Reagan and lobbied on his behalf. James Cagney tried to get the role of Rockne.
Along with plot lines, Didinger and Macnow include quotes from movie reviews; many athletes talk about their favorite movies; documentaries make the Top 100; and there are “Lost Treasures.” One of them is “Million Dollar Legs," a 1932 movie that is a funny spoof of the Olympics starring W. C. Fields and Jack Oakie.
Didinger and Macnow acknowledge that their
Top 100 list is bound to inspire arguments. I have frequently
written about my own Top Ten list. Here it is side by side with
their rankings:
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My strongest disagreement is with the high regard by many for “Raging Bull.” Boxing is a violent enough sport, but director Martin Scorsese is in love with violence in this movie as he is in all his films. He makes it difficult to watch because the fight scenes are beyond belief and reinforce the negative feelings that most of the public has about boxing.
Didinger and Macnow are Philadelphia guys so I can understand their affection for “Rocky” as the best film of all. To their credit they mock all the sequels to the first “Rocky” as inferior stuff. Didinger is one of the foremost pro football authorities in the country so I can understand a preference for football movies in the book’s Top Ten.
They go with the crowd in ranking “The Pride of the Yankees” No. 13. I disagree. They, like everybody, make fun of the William Bendix “Babe Ruth Story” but “Pride of the Yankees’ bathes the audience in syrup; Glenn Close would have looked more like a real ball player than the gawky Gary Cooper.
I would rate “The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings” about a rollicking group of depression-era touring black baseball players higher than their No. 38. I am impressed that they rated “Phar Lap” No. 33; it is about a great Australian racehorse that came to a mysterious end.
They are so knowledgeable and exhaustive
I could find only one movie I liked that they do not mention at
all. That would be “The Crowd Roars” (the 1938 one,
not the 1932 James Cagney film with the same name). In that film,
Robert Taylor squeezes a rubber ball to strengthen his fists.
It inspired me as a 10-year-old to walk around for months squeezing
a rubber ball.
©2009 by Stan Isaacs.
The Stan Isaacs caricature is ©2001 by Jim Hummel. The photo
is courtesy of Running Press. This column first posted Oct. 19,
2009.
TO ACCESS STAN ISAACS' ARCHIVE OF COLUMNS ON THIS SITE, CLICK HERE: ISAACS ARCHIVE
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