This thread is for nominating bad sports movies. No lists, please-just name a sports film and talk about it. Also, no shoehorning a movie in just because for a brief period the protagonists play a game of tennis, chat around a pool table, talk business during a game of racquetball etc.
I thought of starting this thread after seeing 1948’s “The Babe Ruth Story” starring William Bendix. He didn’t look, talk or act anything like Ruth, and the story is whitewashed and stuffed to the gills with crap that never happened. The fact that his first wife is completely erased from history and it was made while Ruth was still alive were special “bonuses”, and the icing on the cake? it included that apocryphal story of promising a child ridden with cancer that he would hit a homerun, subsequently hits two home runs…and the child is cured!
Your pick?
The unnamed Juwanna Mann is probably going to take the prize, but I would vote Days Of Thunder. A big budget film, great director, Tom Cruise, Robert Duvall and a good supporting cast, full cooperation of NASCAR, and…it managed to get nothing right about racing. Horrible characters, unrealistic situations, a stupid love story, and a tacked on heart warming finish. Bonus that it is basically a rip off of both the director and star’s Top Gun. It didn’t mention Tim Richmond by name, but it is clearly based on him, and, were he alive, he’d likely hate it, too. I wonder if NASCAR is suitably embarrassed by that film.
The “classic” The Richard Petty Story, starring non-actor Richard Petty as Richard Petty, great actor Darren “The Old Man” McGavin as Lee Petty, and infant Kyle Petty as infant Kyle Petty, is a weak film and it is still light years ahead of DOT.
Some pint-sized kid has a dream of playing football at Notre Dame. Great. Plenty of high school kids have that dream. But Rudy sucks and is small, and can’t even make it into Notre Dame independent of football.
Through some sort of combination of weird obsession, an inability to face reality, and pitiful wretchedness, he ends up at Notre Dame and on the practice squad, but still not part of the team, not even the extraneous ones who don’t dress out. Then, through sheer grit, determination and a never-say-die attitude, he gets to play one down in garbage time because everyone involved felt sorry for him, including letting him dress out, and even putting him in the game.
What’s the lesson here? Be such a determined loser, and eventually someone will pity you and throw you a meaningless bone? The guy didn’t make the team, didn’t actually earn anything, just basically was a loser who they felt sorry for.
Is this a good lesson? Or is there value in saying “Hey kid, you’re 5’9” and 140. You’re never going to play at Notre Dame." and you know, accepting that and moving on with your life.
Well, Days of Thunder would have to take a backseat to the horribly unfunny Stroker Ace, the movie that put Burt Reynolds’s career into reverse for a dozen years.
When I read the thread title I thought of a different Babe Ruth movie. The Babe with John Goodman. I remember almost nothing about it other than it not being good at all.
The lesson is, to me, “if you are a relentless enough pest, you’ll get something.” Which is, frankly, also how the movie got made: Ruettinger pestered filmmakers for a decade until they made a movie about him.
Really, this is your nomination for the worst sports movie? I mean, you either eat up the sappy sentimentality of it or not, but in no conceivable way is this even in the running for worst sports movie.
except that he actually, you know, did get in and play for Notre Dame
Technically, that would be sports-entertainment. Arguably, sports-entertainment is a type of sports, albeit one with a predetermined outcome.
What about sports-fantasy movies? Have you ever been condemned to…
Can’t deny deathsport is a sport. I mean, it’s right there in the title. Movie is very bad, though not completely without a few virtues.
In the event Deathsport does not count, Safe at Home! (1962) co-starring Mantle and Maris is supposed to be exceptionally bad, though I’ve never seen it.
