I’m no sports fan. I find no interest in sports, and I really don’t watch it, but “Through the Fire” is not about sports. You don’t have to like sports to know how damn good this is. It’s typical to say such a thing, but as a man who hasn’t seen a full basketball game in eleven years, it says something about the sheer quality and excellence of “Through the Fire”, that it was able to grab a hold of me and keep me glued to the screen. It’s not an insider documentary, it’s not a new look at sports, and it is not an exploitative peek at a man who ruined himself. It’s simply a down to Earth story about a young man who worked for his dreams and achieved them.
Tag Archives: sports
Bring it On Again (2004)
Finally, the long awaited–well, not long awaited–finally the much anticipated–well, not anticipated, finally the curiously thought of… well no one actually wanted this. Well, anyway, this sequel of the direct to video status is what you’d suspect is the sequel to “Bring it On”. Now, much to everyone’s surprise, I thought “Bring it On” was an original and very entertaining comedy about cheerleaders and delved in to the sports world of that facet. And it was butchered to death with a company that refuses to know when to quit, and thus, here’s the sequel. Suffice it to say “Bring it on Again” is less a bad movie, and more pointless.
Miracle (2004)
It’s one of the most amazing stories in sports, the stuff that legends are made of, and it’s a riveting underdog tale whether you’re sports fan or not. The king was dead, there was an oil crisis and the nation was basically in turmoil, until the story of this one Olympic hockey team took the world by storm and gave the nation just a little hope that is sorely was in need of. I’m what people call “Not a sports fan” (made that up myself), so it’s never usually on my list of things to do when sports movies come out, but for “Miracle” I was intrigued. Simply for the fact that this wasn’t just a sports story, it was an underdog tale, a tale of hope in a time without it, and a tale of people coming together to take on their enemy on the ice.
Torque (2004)
Why anyone would want to rip off “The Matrix” is understandable; it was a very influential movie that paved the way for a lot of really bad, and mediocre rip-offs to come for years that I would inevitably have to suffer through, but why anyone would want to rip-off “The Fast and the Furious”, a mediocre action popcorn flick fueled (no pun intended) only by Vin Diesel’s pecks and some good effects is a stunner. Like many have said, dumb studio execs tend to confuse high grosses with film quality and what “The Fast and the Furious” had was not quality. Charisma? Yes. Good effects? Granted. But quality? I’m afraid not, my friend, so why do we have to suffer through these horrible rip-offs? Directed by Joseph Kahn, who is, surprise, surprise, a music video director, composes one really bad B movie that isn’t even worthy of being called a B movie because it’s so blatantly a really long drawn out music video sans the music ad nauseum.
Extreme Ops (2002)
This is not regular ops, this is not plain ops, no this is Extreme Ops, what are Extreme Ops? Who knows, and we never really find out, but in this film we meet a group of extreme risk takers and extreme stuntmen, not sports stars but more rebellious young men and women who will take any risk. They’re gathered by an extreme commercial director to record an extreme DV camera commercial, but when they arrive on the mountain to record some sequences, they’re accidentally neighbored with a group of terrorists that think the group of extreme boarders, skiers and risk takers are really CIA agents out to stop their operation. Not very smart terrorists considering they’d probably be aware by now who is or isn’t a government official.
Bend It Like Beckham (2002)
Gurinder Chadha tells the tale of Jess (played by the beautiful Parminder Nagra), the youngest in a traditional Hindu family who still follows the ritual of arranged marriages, and ceremonial garbs, but loves to play futbol. She plays it with an all boys team against her parents wishes. She is recruited one day by Jules, a professional futbol player who asks Jess to play for her professional team in which they’ll be coached by the potential love interest for the two and maybe Jess and Jules will be recruited into the American futbol team, but not if her mother and father have anything to say about it.
Seabiscuit (2003)
This depression-era tale and celebration of Americana, based on true events is a marvel to watch that doesn’t totally grab you from the get go, but it surely is worth watching. Directed and adapted by Gary Ross and based on the true tale of the undersized horse who lifted a nation’s spirits and brought America to its toes with its speed as the underdog, “SeaBiscuit” becomes a tale about beating the odds, the triumph of competition, and how one small animal can bring a nation together to forget its miseries. This is not a movie about a horse, no it is not, it is a tale about a horse and the three broken people who were brought together by the drive to compete.