Category: Movies

Sporty

Friday Feature, Movies, Sports

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve had the great good fortune to watch a few sports movies, again.  (I’ve seen them all at least twice before, but I hadn’t watched many of them for well over a decade.  It was like saying hello to old friends, it was.)  Here they are, in no specific order:

Bull Durham — Kevin Costner, Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins.  I know the last two are ‘orrible Commies, but that doesn’t take away from the movie’s excellence.  Best part is that it’s pure comedy, unlike the realism of the ones that follow.

Trouble With The Curve — Clint Eastwood, Amy Adams.  Somehow, within the overall frame of the movie, Clinty managed to fit in three little sub-plots:  his relationship with his daughter, her budding relationship with her admirer, and the eternal struggle between the job you love and the successful career (in this case, also hers).  The main plot, that of Clinty struggling to keep his job while persisting in the old ways, is of course brilliant because Eastwood.

Moneyball — Brad Pitt.  Like Draft Day, throw in an actual plot with real characters, drop Brad’s excellent take on Billy Beane’s career with Oakland, and you have it all — without the happy happy joy joy denouement for Billy, just as it actually happened.

Thus spurred on by baseball, I turned to (American) football.

Draft Day — Kevin Costner (again).  Take a suspenseful plot, sprinkle it with realism (real NFL teams and some actual characters, e.g. Jim Brown and Bernie Kosar), throw in an unforgiving timeline, and you have a lovely sports movie that looks behind the scenes instead of on the field.  I have no idea how realistic it was, but that’s not important.

North Dallas Forty — Nick Nolte, Mac Davis.  After watching all the above, I dug into my DVD collection to watch this old warhorse again, and surprise surprise!  this gritty NFL story was pretty much as relevant today as it was back in the early 70s.  (And who would have thought C&W star Mac Davis could turn in such a clever performance?)

Any Given Sunday — Al Pacino.  I really love this movie, because even though it’s highly dramatized — it’s a movie, duh — I like the realism of the characters, all of them.  And for once, Pacino doesn’t chew up the scenery but is actually quite a sympathetic character.

Rudy — Quite possibly one of the greatest true sports stories ever put on film.  Absolutely brilliant, all the way through.

Everybody’s All-American — Dennis Quaid, Jessica Lange.  What happens to the college superstar after the spotlight has moved on to the next generation.  Quaid is perfect in the role, that shit-eating grin and past glories powering him through life’s disappointments, with the ex-homecoming queen at his side.

The Blind Side — Amy Adams  Sandra Bullock.  Another true story, only slightly dramatized for the movies.  Sandra just steals this movie and takes it home with her.  Even better is that it’s all mostly true.  Of course, the critics hated it because of all the usual reasons: a gun-toting pretty Christian mom doing the right thing by a poor Black kid, and succeeding.

Of course, this is by no means a comprehensive list — and yes I know there are dozens of others out there.  I just happened to hit on this lot, got hooked into watching them all, and enjoyed every single one of them.

You will, too.

Feelin’ The Noize

Friday Feature, Movies, Music

I was never a huge fan of loud Brit rockers Slade — I didn’t mind the loud, but it was really simple music, while I was getting into Yes, Emerson Lake & Palmer and Genesis (to name but some).

Still, in those pre-metal days, there were times when you just needed to kick out and jump around, and few were better at kicking-out-and-jumping-around music than the Boys From The Black Country.

“What’s that, honky?  How could they be White boys in Black Country?”

Shuddup and watch this (very) sympathetic treatment of Slade in their heyday, back when they were huge.

And yes, in retrospect, their songs were excellent.

Sadly, it seems as though Noddy has throat cancer, and hasn’t that long to go.  Raw suckage, that is.

Master

Movies, Sports

If you’ve got nothing special to do for a couple of hours this evening, take a look at Ronnie O’Sullivan, yet again wearing his opponent down by sheer persistence and peerless skill, even though down by three frames at the beginning of the video.

What’s amazing is that Ronnie was not at his best and it showed in a couple of careless misses, but even against an opponent who was the class of the field all week (scored more centuries than anyone ever has), the Rocket just held on and battered away, becoming the oldest Masters winner ever.  And that with an elbow injury so severe he couldn’t raise the trophy afterwards, needing his kids to do it for him.

Pure magic.

If you want to do the marathon, here’s the whole match.  Watch it over three days, like I did.  (Of course, it’s been colder than the Witch of Endor’s tits this week, so I had little else to do.  YMMV.)

Two Old Guys Chewing The Fat

Friday Feature, Movies, The Gun Thing

…about revolvers, and what they love to shoot.

What’s so different about this one?  It’s Ken Hackathorn and Bill Wilson.

“Shooting should be fun.”

That episode was Ken’s favorite guns to shoot.  Here’s what Bill likes to shoot.

“Every gun guy should own a Model 19 Combat Magnum.”

And then if you want still more Hackathorn and Wilson, here’s an earlier episode, about 1911s.

“Rarely does the capacity of the gun have anything to do with the outcome… unless you’re a really bad shot.”  (Although it should be said that Bill Wilson himself carries a Wilson SFX-9 with a 10-round mag — and a 15-round backup mag.  And nobody could call Bill Wilson a bad shot.)

I could listen to these two gun guys talk all day.  And in putting this post together, I did.