The Best Sports Films That Aren’t About Sports
Whether you intend to watch ’the big game’ on Sunday or not, there’s just something about a great sports narrative. And no, we’re not talking about the NFL’s tired retread of a matchup we already saw two years ago between Kansas City and the Philadelphia Eagles— we’re talking about sports movies. Even if you’re more into watching film than sports— and let’s be honest, if you’re part of the Film Independent community, then there’s a good chance of that — the best sports films have something for everyone. There’s the irresistible underdog you can’t help rooting for. Determined characters coming together to face insurmountable odds. The framework— an individual or team in pursuit of greatness — is a classic hero’s journey. But as the films below showcase, the best sports stories aren’t actually about the sport at all. They’re about relationships, and all relationships at their core are about love, whether platonic, romantic, familial, or with the self. With Valentine’s Day coming up, what better way to merge the love of the game with the love of cinema, than to explore the best sports films that aren’t about sports (they’re about love).
CHALLENGERS
Director: Luca Guadagnino
Writer: Justin Kuritzkes
Cast: Zendaya, Josh O’Connor, Mike Faist
Why We Love It: If the best sports movies use sport as metaphor, then Challengers is the champ. Every scene in this movie is about power and sex— who has it, who doesn’t, who wants it… who doesn’t. Every relationship is a game, as we watch two friends turned rivals played by Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist compete in tennis and love, while the cool and calculating object of their affection, tennis prodigy turned coach Tashi Duncan (Zendaya), turns the tables on them both.
It’s designed to get you a little hot and bothered, milking the physicality and attractiveness of all involved. While I personally found the queer undertones between the two men a little too manipulative (Just make out already!), I have to give Challengers credit for crafting a power play menage-a-trois that is both original and dynamic. The intense, cinematic tennis matches act as conversations between characters, as they compete not just for the woman they both love, but for the love lost between them and the very sport itself. By the end of the film, both men are bruised and beaten, and the stakes of their final match have never been higher. Challengers explores how growing up changes your relationships— not just with friends and lovers, but with the very thing you loved so much you sacrificed everything to it as a passionate youth— ultimately questioning what in life is really worth fighting for.
LOVE & BASKETBALL
Writer/Director: Gina Prince-Bythewood
Cast: Omar Epps, Sanaa Lathan, Alfre Woodard
Why We Love It: Two words: Strip. Basketball. As a youngster obsessed with both basketball and cinema, this film left a huge impression on me after its initial release, and has cemented itself as a cult classic ever since. Omar Epps and Sanaa Lathan’s chemistry is off the charts in a story about two talented athletes, Monica (Lathan) and Quincy (Epps), who bond over a shared love of basketball. The film follows their complicated relationship from childhood to adulthood. It’s a compelling push-and-pull between two people who are perfect for each other, but their pursuits of individual glory keep driving them apart. Youthful lust and competition eventually give way to mutual love and respect, making it the most romantic film on this list by far. It also created the blueprint for the sports as sexual innuendo that made last year’s Challengers such a hit. Produced by Spike Lee, writer/director Gina Prince-Bythewood’s directorial debut won her the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay, while star Sanaa Lathan won the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture. With the film, Prince-Bythewood wanted to normalize the idea that women, especially women of color, can and should aspire to having the career and relationships they deserve. Speaking about the film, she said, “Girls are often told you can’t have both, so I just wanted to normalize the belief that you can have both. I wanted to normalize girls like Monica, who were girls like me, who grew up playing sports and were… made to feel different”. While she went on to make bigger budget films like The Old Guard and Woman King, her passion and skill portraying ambitious, fully-realized women onscreen started here.
THE IRON CLAW
Writer/Director: Sean Durkin
Cast: Zac Efron, Harris Dickinson, Jeremy Allen White, Maura Tierney
Why We Love It: Sean Durkin’s (Martha Marcy May Marlene) devastating film is about brothers, masculinity, and wrestling, but at its heart, it’s about familial love, and how not expressing it can have devastating consequences. It’s also Zac Efron’s best performance. Based on the true story of the Von Erich brothers, a wrestling dynasty forever altered by unimaginable loss, the fictional version centers on Zac Efron’s Kevin, as he watches his younger brothers, played by Harris Dickinson and Jeremy Allen White, rise to fame in the world of competitive wrestling. While the patriarch Fritz is the walking definition of toxic masculinity, seizing every opportunity to undermine his sons and pit them against each other while pushing them to their limits, the brothers’ love and respect for each other is a joy to watch. The Iron Claw is a great example of cinema’s golden rule: ‘Show Not Tell’, and it’s often what’s not said that gives the story its power. Durkin wisely chooses not to exploit the family’s tragedies onscreen, focusing instead on the quiet agony of the aftermath, as surviving characters face the unimaginable. One of its most powerful moments comes from Maura Tierney’s underrated performance as a grieving matriarch struggling with what dress to wear to a son’s funeral. Without speaking a word, Tierney’s character conveys the unbearable cost of things left unsaid, things that could have possibly helped mend a broken family. Despite its heartbreaking story, The Iron Claw leaves us feeling hopeful, as Efron’s character finally confronts his father’s poisonous legacy by choosing to express love and vulnerability in front of his own sons. We can’t think of any greater display of strength, onscreen or off.
HUSTLE
Director: Jeremiah Zagar
Writers: Taylor Materne & Will Fetters
Cast: Adam Sandler, Queen Latifah, Ben Foster, Robert DuVall
Why We Love It: With a relatively simple set up, about a downtrodden NBA scout played by Adam Sandler discovering a player in Spain with the capacity for greatness, Hustle endears its audience with two tried and true techniques: 1. Utilizing Adam Sandler’s skills as a dramatic actor, and 2. Crafting a father-son dynamic between two underdogs who are both in pursuit of a dream against all odds.
Sandler’s Stanley is a jaded recruiter for the 76ers who, after a clash with his nepo baby new boss, played by Ben Foster, gets sent overseas on a grueling scout, where he stumbles across a local pick up game and discovers Bo Cruz, a raw talent on no one else’s radar. Sandler’s charm isn’t lost here, as he doggedly pursues Bo, a once promising player who initially gave up his dream of playing in the U.S. after his girlfriend got pregnant. Recognizing Bo’s untapped potential, Stanley brings him to the states to try and get him a real shot at the NBA, but Bo’s temper keeps getting in the way, as he’s arrested for aggravated assault at the airport and thrown out of the Combine when another player trash talks him. Despite this, Stanley decides to quit his job and focus all his energy on Bo, who initially lacks a consistent work ethic, but starts to blossom under his coaching. Stanley acts as a surrogate father to Bo, whose relationship with his own young daughter endears us to him, even as his inexperience and quickness to anger make him a challenging surrogate son. It’s an emotionally satisfying journey that proves all you need is one person to really see you and say yes.
WARRIOR
Director: Gavin O’Connor
Writers: Gavin O’Connor, Anthony Tambakis, Cliff Dorfman
Cast: Joel Edgerton, Tom Hardy, Nick Nolte
Why We Love It: An excellent film that flew under the radar during its release way back in 2011, Warrior is always worth a watch. It explores a fraught relationship between two estranged brothers, played by Joel Edgerton and Tom Hardy, as they compete against each other in an MMA tournament. Both want the prize money for different but equally valid reasons— Edgerton is a financially struggling family man with two daughters, while Hardy is a war hero who promises his winnings to the widow of one of his fallen comrades. Growing up, both brothers endured the abuse of their alcoholic father, played by Nick Nolte, and both still carry the pain from it. Their father has since gotten sober, but he still doesn’t have the trust of either son. When Tommy, played by Hardy, returns home to compete in the tournament, he agrees to let his dad coach him again, even though he hasn’t spoken to his family in years. The psychological and emotional wounds in Warrior are as raw and bloody as the ones the fighters give each other in the arena. If you’ve ever watched mixed martial arts, you know it’s a no-holds-barred brutal sport, and it provides the perfect outlet for years of simmering resentment and rage between the two brothers. The movie is one long fuse that burns all the way up to an explosive match up in which brother must fight brother for the ultimate prize. While Tom Hardy displays the terrifying savagery and brute strength he brought to roles like Bronson and The Dark Knight Rises, Edgerton plays the underdog in more ways than one, as he finally confronts the pain he caused the younger brother he abandoned all those years ago.
Like any sibling dynamic, the brothers are at odds as much as they are bonded in mutual trauma against their father, but one of the film’s most memorable moments comes when Nick Nolte’s character relapses and Hardy’s response is not anger but compassion, as he embraces and comforts his sobbing, drunken father. Warrior is a movie about healing, which is something we all need more of.
THE WAY BACK
Director: Gavin O’Connor
Writer: Brad Ingelsby
Cast: Ben Affleck, Al Madrigal, Janina Gavankar
Why We Love It: A subtle movie released during the pandemic with little fanfare, The Way Back proves director Gavin O’Connor’s talent once again for healing broken men onscreen. The story follows Jack Cunningham, played by Ben Affleck, a high school basketball prodigy who’s now an alcoholic separated from his wife and grieving the loss of his son. When his former Catholic school asks him to come back and coach the struggling basketball team, it provides an outlet for Jack to finally face his demons. The film doesn’t end in typical fashion, with Jack overcoming the odds and leading the unlikely team to a championship. Instead, he has a breakdown and finally decides to get help for his disease, while confronting his grief over his son and apologizing to his wife. It’s a poignant exploration of a man’s struggle against himself, and the sport of basketball provides the perfect vehicle for what is ultimately a battle of the soul. The script by Brad Ingelsby, with its complex explorations of masculinity and genuine love of basketball (also on display in his Emmy-winning series Mare of Easttown), doesn’t shy away from difficult subject matter. It’s a personal film in the best way, not just for Ingelsby, who comes from a family of basketball players and coaches, but for Affleck, whose struggles with addiction unfortunately became public due to his celebrity. This, combined with his highly publicized divorce at the time, created an internet obsession dubbed ‘sad Affleck’, and while the memes bordered on cruelty in their mockery of a real man in genuine crisis, Affleck’s ability to embrace even the darkest parts of himself makes this performance one of the best of his career. It’s a beautiful, redemptive film, and its bravery in tackling flaws head on with unapologetic vulnerability is exactly the kind of thing that makes cinema worth watching.
JERRY MAGUIRE
Writer/Director: Cameron Crowe
Cast: Reneé Zellweger, Tom Cruise, Cuba Gooding Jr., Regina King
Why We Love It: If a film is lucky, one of its quotes will make it into the cultural lexicon. Jerry Maguire, however, has not one, but three unforgettable lines (runner up goes to ‘Did you know the human head weighs eight pounds?’), showcasing its legacy as one of the best sport movies of all time. There are two relationships central to the film— the first is titular character Jerry’s difficult relationship with Cuba Gooding Jr.’s Rod Tidwell, a washed-up NFL receiver and the only client to stick by him after he leaves his company during a crisis of conscience. Jerry does something we should all do– question professional football’s problematic legacy, rife with abuse scandals and horrific injuries to the players, among other things. As a sports agent willing to do whatever it takes for his clients, however, Jerry is now at the mercy of Rod, who demands all his time and attention.
Watching Rod Tidwell, with his larger-than-life personality and an ego more fragile than a soap bubble, put Tom Cruise’s Jerry through the ringer is hilarious, if not infuriatingly relatable to anyone who’s ever had a difficult client or boss (aka everyone). It’s no wonder then that his demand for Jerry to ‘Show me the money!’ became an instant classic when it comes to catch phrases, and won Cuba Gooding Jr. the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.
But it’s the relationship between Rod and his wife, played by an excellent Regina King, that brings about Jerry’s personal evolution. As a man who only ever learned to love his job, their marriage, with all its ups and downs, its exuberant passions and unapologetic expression of them, teaches Jerry what real love looks like. Jerry, for all his ambition, is a man terrified of love, and this is the root of all his problems. His burgeoning friendship with his best and only client, however, leads him to finally see what was right in front of him all along— faithful employee and love interest Dorothy Boyd, played by Reneé Zellweger, the only other person to follow him on this new, perilous journey after he quits his company in spectacularly humiliating fashion. Jerry’s epiphany, that he needs his new wife Dorothy as much as he needs Rod, gave us a romantic declaration for the record books that includes the iconic line, ‘You complete me’, to which she replies, ‘You had me at hello.’
Jerry Maguire is the complete package, a movie about love and friendship that understands the people who stick by you at your lowest are the ones worth keeping around.
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