Movie of the Week: Hoosiers

    

    Movie of the Week (3/16/13-3/22/14): Well, there is no doubt about it that I am very late this week, my apologies to those of you in dying need of a movie to watch this week. But, we still have something to watch even if it is late. With the NCAA Basketball Tournament starting this week I thought it was right to have a basketball movie this week. That being said this was much harder than I thought because there are not very many good basketball movies out there. So, I simply narrowed it down to probably the best basketball movie of all time, Hoosiers. 

    First of all it is not about Indiana University, thank God, it is about an Indiana high school giving a coach who has had a rough past a second chance at doing what he knows best, coaching. He takes over a high school basketball team that is not very good and turns them into winners. In the process he gives the town drunk a second chance at coaching because he sees something in him. It is a true story set in 1954 with some changes to history but it is still a very good true underdog story. 

    There is really not much of a cast here, most people today would only know two of them and they are Gene Hackman and Dennis Hopper. We have Barbara Hershey in a very good supporting role, but not very many people know who she is, but nevertheless she still does a very good job. But, we have Gene Hackman, as Coach Norman Dale, who is great here and delivers us another fine "Gene Hackman" performance. We also have Dennis Hopper as Shooter, the town drunk who also gets a second chance, and he too is phenomenal as he went on to be nominated of an Oscar. You can tell that he prepared for his role very well as he convinced the audience that he was truly the town drunk who struggled at getting his life together. 

    There are a few things that make this a good film, the first is the direction. This was directed by David Anspaugh, the same guy who directed Rudy, and he gave this film the classic feel to it as he used very little effects and classical camera work. That being said the cinematography is great here as it sets the perfect mood of the Midwest and the feel of high school basketball in the 1950's. The score here is also very moving and inspiring. We can thank Jerry Goldsmith for that because he knew exactly how to score this film, he was nominated for an Oscar as well, and give it the final boost of inspiration it needed. He was also the man that gave us the Rudy score. What this film is really about is second chances and that the underdog can really win and in the end it will inspire you and leave a smile on your face.

3/4 Stars.