OT: Favorite football movie?
Just rewatched "Any Given Sunday" for the umpteenth time. Love that film's camera shots, it's gritty realism, and Al Pacino's speech at the end. That Jamie Foxx can ball.
Hoping to get another few football movies in before Saturday. Any recommendations?
August 28th, 2014 at 9:57 PM ^
LOL - when they wanted to take out the opposing team's ringer, they showed a pile-up at the goal line. Prior to giving the ringer some sort of sedative injection, in the pile, the guy with the syringe is sterilizing the injection area with alcohol or something - fucking hilarious.
August 28th, 2014 at 10:10 AM ^
but I love this movie. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBbAiS9ccF4
August 28th, 2014 at 10:20 AM ^
Hoosiers
/Indiana
August 28th, 2014 at 10:50 AM ^
Not a football movie.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:03 AM ^
in Indiana
August 28th, 2014 at 10:19 AM ^
Laces out!
August 28th, 2014 at 10:31 AM ^
Brian Song (original)
Longest Yard (original)
Jim Thorpe All American
Heaven Can Wait
August 28th, 2014 at 10:31 AM ^
its on my DVR ..... UTL #1 (great cast and what an ending !!!!)
Go Blue!
August 28th, 2014 at 10:37 AM ^
That game is kind of like the 2004 MSU game. No Michigan fan in their right mind is going to watch the first 2 1/2 hours.
August 28th, 2014 at 12:17 PM ^
I remember watching that game with a state-fan friend of my brothers. After things go south, I am freaking out. However, I act all confident through the entire game. I keep saying, "Michigan is going to win, man," through the whole fourth quarter. Even though I am 99.9 percent sure that I am going to have to eat crow. My brother's friend keeps acting incredulous even as Braylon started to Braylon. Even after Braylon's second touchdown, I told him, "I told you so" like I already knew the ending and I was completely unsuprised. The misery on his face was priceless. Still the best troll job I ever did on anyone.
August 28th, 2014 at 10:32 AM ^
Heaven Can Wait, the 70's version with Warren Beatty. He plays Joe Pendleton, a quarterback for the LA Rams who is prematurely "pulled out of life" by an anxious angel, played by Buck Henry. So his spirit has to find a new body to inhabit, someone who is just about to die. He ends up in an asshole billionaire's body, but is determined to get that body in good enough shape to try out for the Rams. Everyone around him thinks he's crazy, except for one of the trainers, played by Jack Warden, who believes he is really the dead QB in the billionaire's body. He ends up buying the Rams to get a tryout, but before he can get a chance to see the field, the billionaire's body is killed by his crazy wife (played by Dyan Cannon) who has been trying to kill him all along. The last scene is the Rams in the Superbowl. The current quarterback takes a hit which essentially kills him (it's his time to go), so Joe Pendleton's spirit steps into that body and they go on to win the game, with him quarterbacking. It's about fate and circumstance, and has a great 70's cast.
August 28th, 2014 at 10:37 AM ^
I love the scene where Warren Beatty is doing pushups in the clouds, his body pops up every one. Very good flick.
August 28th, 2014 at 10:48 AM ^
North Dallas Forty, gritty yet fun movie with a wink and a nod toward the Dallas Cowboys
Longest Yard, "He broke his f***ing neck." The original
Necessary Roughness, Kathy Ireland...nuff said
Brian's Song, The original TV movie, it captured a nation and made guys cry from coast to coast. It's all that we talked about in school the next morning.
The aforementioned M*A*S*H football game. Not a football movie, per se, but one of the most iconic movie football games ever.
August 28th, 2014 at 10:48 AM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 10:49 AM ^
i would say my my 4 favorite football movies of all time are
1. rudy, i just love the inspiration he shows and passion he shows to get what he wants in life
2. varsity blues, this is a classic with a lot of humor to me that i never get tired of watching
3. facing the giants, i love how this movie depicts how nothing in life is to big to overcome and if you really put your heart and mind into something you can truly overcome
4. the blind side, love how it shows that no matter where you come from if you have talent it will be found
just my take
August 28th, 2014 at 2:48 PM ^
Trust me -- you will enjoy this movie!
First, the narrative/telling is incredible film-making.
But the story itself is the most impossible-but-true football tale ever memorialized in film. Calvin Hill. Tommy Lee Jones. Meryl Streep. George Bush. Al Gore. Gary Trudeau. Sexual revolution. Vietnam war. Conference Championship at stake. National ranking at stake. Two undefeated teams. Bitter rivals.
A shy underclassman has to overcome adversity to take over the big game. An unsavory antagonist resorts to foul play. Zebra controversy. And an ending that would have been rejected in Hollywood as too improbable had this been fiction [SPOILER - 16 points are scored in the final 42 seconds of play].
August 28th, 2014 at 10:59 AM ^
We beat Notre Dame.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:15 AM ^
Don't forget Jumper when we beat PSU.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:00 AM ^
If you wanna win, put Boobie in!!
August 28th, 2014 at 11:00 AM ^
I can't decide between The Program and Varsity Blues - probably The Program since Michigan beats the vaunted ESU Timberwolves.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:08 AM ^
Yeah. It's a TV show. But it's still my favorite compared to any football movie.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:14 AM ^
Rudy
Yes, bring the down votes. Sorry, but it's a good movie.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:18 AM ^
1. The Program - It came out when I was in High School so I remember watching it repeatedly. I often ask my 6 year old daughter if she is hurt or injured when she is upset.
2, North Dallas Forty - The guy who wrote the book used to speak at our middle school when I was there. He was not a big fan of pro football to say the least
3. Any Given Sunday
4. Remember the Titans
5. Necessary Roughness
The guys who played Lattimer from The Program was also in Necessary Roughness and Any Given Sunday.
The TV show Friday Night Lights blows all these movies out of the water.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:17 AM ^
Worst: Rudy. Sure go ahead and work your but off and play harder tan anybody else, you'll still only get in on two plays. Rudy should have transferred.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:18 AM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 11:21 AM ^
...and I know every line to Remember the Titans, so that too.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:33 AM ^
Blind Side, Invincible, even though there are some skewed facts and North Dallas Forty.
http://www.nfl.com/photoessays/09000d5d82952ed3
Link has a good list of some movies which I had forgotten about...
August 28th, 2014 at 11:33 AM ^
Like, whatever. The movie makes me feel unaccomplished and brings back all my Catholic guilt, but in a good, fuzzy way. Gets me every time.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:35 AM ^
Victory! When Stallone with a little help from Pele beat the Nazis...oops wrong football
August 28th, 2014 at 11:44 AM ^
Also, never forget the all-time classic The Garbage Picking Field Goal Kicking Philadelphia Phenomenon.
August 28th, 2014 at 11:50 AM ^
Pains me to say it, but Rudy is the best.
I've heard that the new film out, When the Game Stands Tall, is good.
Friday Night Lights (the motion picture) is an absolutely criminal act perpetrated on the book. Keep wanting to try the TV series to see if it can properly portray the book in themes.
Remember the Titans is solid.
August 28th, 2014 at 12:29 PM ^
You named the same four I would! But with a different spin or two...
I loved Friday Night Lights as a movie, one entirely separate from the book of the same name. For all intents and purposes, they are different works. FNL is my favorite football movie; FNL is one of my favorite documentarian/investigative/journalistic/storytelling books. Two separate things.
However, let me save you some time...the show is worse. Way worse. It sucks. It is teenie drama crap. My wife (the smartest and best person I know, but also a lady who can relax by watching vampire shows) watches it as a guilty pleasure. The show is as divorced from the movie as the movie is from the book.
When the Game Stands Tall was excellent. I loved it. A lot. One of my favorite parts is during an emotional team meeting:
"...tomorrow, I will fight for you guys, until I die out there, if I have to."
Coach, interjecting: "Collapse. Not die. It's just high school football."
Good perspective on life.
August 28th, 2014 at 2:59 PM ^
I love the show Friday Night Lights. The acting is superb.
August 28th, 2014 at 12:01 PM ^
Gets my vote... One of my favorite movies
August 28th, 2014 at 12:07 PM ^
For a serious film, Remember the Titans. For a comedy, The Water Boy.
August 28th, 2014 at 12:09 PM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 12:29 PM ^
My favorite football movie is the The Garbage Picking Field Goal Kicking Philadelphia Phenomenon
But I do want to say Varsity Blues strictly because Jon Voight is awsome in that movie.
August 28th, 2014 at 12:29 PM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 12:29 PM ^
Not a football movie per say, but this guy seems like a hell of a coach.
August 28th, 2014 at 12:37 PM ^
Talks and touches about everything in College Football. Was way ahead of its time.
College kids and steroids
College kids who actually wanted a degree.
Relationships
Racial boundaries
Bag men
Illegal activity
Coaches who knew and didn't know what was going on w the kids
Heisman. Pressure
Alcoholism
Parental pressure
Rape and Cover up
The stigma of a Football player on a large campus.
Recruiting
Boosters
The movie has it all
August 28th, 2014 at 12:41 PM ^
terroist plan to blow up blimp over the Super Bowl. Film in the late 70's.
August 28th, 2014 at 7:23 PM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 12:41 PM ^
Remember the TItans and Rudy
August 28th, 2014 at 12:50 PM ^
I really like Invincible, too.
August 28th, 2014 at 1:48 PM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 12:50 PM ^
August 28th, 2014 at 12:58 PM ^