Movies and sport
by Paolo Valassi
From boxing to soccer, from basketball to American football and track and field, Hollywood has often drawn inspiration from the world of sport. The results have been ambitious films starring big stars who play legendary figures (Robert De Niro - Jack La Motta in Raging Bull or Paul Newman as Rocky Graziano in Somebody Up There Likes Me). Other times the inspiration comes from real events (duly fictionalized) as in Chariots of Fire in which the Englishman Eric Liddell refuses to run the final of the 100 meters at the 1924 Paris Olympics because the race fell on a Sunday, a day sanctified by the Lord.
Team sports such as basketball or American football often provide the pretext for addressing issues such as social redemption, "team work", the sacrifice of each individual member aimed at achieving a common goal; paradigmatic in this regard is Al Pacino's motivational speech in Any Given Sunday.
But all these films, more or less successful, have a great flaw in common, I would say intrinsic to the subject matter: the charm of sport, by definition, is unpredictability.
Every sporting event must be experienced live because, even if there is a clear favorite, you never have absolute certainty of how it will end. In a film, however, the charm of uncertainty is missing, we know that everything has already been written, we know that what we see is only fiction. Rocky is a great film up until the moment the first punch is thrown in the ring between the protagonist and Apollo; and we knew that Karate Kid would win the tournament before we even left home to go to the cinema.
One of the few exceptions to this rule is Big Wednesday by John Milius, released in 1978.
Three young surfer friends chase the perfect wave on the beaches of California.
Life and the Vietnam War will separate their lives and change them profoundly.
Years later, now adults and with families to support, one morning they hear the news on the radio of the arrival of a formidable storm with waves never seen before. And as if by magic, without having agreed, they find themselves on the beach that had seen them as teenagers for one last "ride".
Through the adventures in the water of the three protagonists, the film addresses universal themes (death, war, the end of adolescence) but also the great values of sport such as friendship, fun, competition and the recognition of the value of the opponent. All this topped off with breathtaking images of surfing stunts.
Fun fact: one of the surfer friends is played by actor Gary Busey who 13 years later, in Kate Bigelow's film Point Break, will play FBI agent Angelo Pappas, who convinces his colleague Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) to learn to surf to hunt down the gang of bank robbers called the "Ex-Presidents".
P.S. It may be fiction but Pelè's overhead kick in Escape to Victory is spine-chilling.