Top 5 Basketball Movies Of All Time

Apparently the Bull Durham omission from the baseball movie list was a worse snub than Jordan keeping Isiah off of the 1992 Dream Team.  I aplolgize.  But in case you weren't paying attention, the Tom Emanski's Instructional Videos made the list.  Wasn't meant to be taken literally.  But whatever.  Here is a more serious list of the best hoop movies of all time.

5.  Hoosiers (1986) - A coach with a checkered past and a local drunk named "Shooter" train a small town high school team to become a top contender for the championship.  Can't beat a plot like that.  And I'm from northern New Hampshire, so that exact story line could be applied to every single high school soccer, basketball, and baseball season in the town's history.  Except by "contender for the championship," we would have to sub in "bunch of shit heads who broke every red-card and technical foul record in the state, who were generally seen as an embarrassment around the state."  But other than that, it was pretty much the exact same thing, so I can relate.


4.  Semi Pro (2008) - The most underrated film on the list.  If you don't like the movie, it's just because you don't like Will Ferrell.  And if you don't like Will Ferrell, then you're an idiot.  Ipso facto, if you don't like this movie, you're an idiot.  In full disclosure, I watched this movie while working on a half pint of Turkey 101 and a $9 Pepsi from the concession stand.  That, and I had really low expectations for the movie.  So yeah, that's the magic formula, for everything really.  Be drunk and have low expectations.  You'll win every time.





3.  Hoop Dreams (1994) - If you haven't seen it and like basketball, then find it and watch it.  All joking aside, this movie is great.  Originally intended to be a 30-minute short, it eventually led to five years of filming and 250 hours of footage. It premiered at the 1994 Sundance Film Festival where it won the Audience Award for Best Documentary. Despite its length (171 minutes) and genre, it received high critical and popular acclaim. It was on more critics' top ten lists than any other film that year, including Pulp Fiction, Forest Gump, and The Shawshank Redemption.  The film follows two African-American teenagers as they are recruited by a prestigious, mostly white Illinois high school that is well known for it's outstanding basketball program.





2.  He Got Game (1998) - OK, yeah, there are times in the movie where Ray Allen might as well have stayed home and the film could have as easily have used a statue, but at least Spike Lee got an actual basketball player to play the role, rather than having Omar Epps run around, looking all awkward and crap.  And the father/son, Denzel Washington/Ray Allen dynamic was perfect.





1.  White Man Can't Jump (1992) - Easily number one.  Just a great movie.  Every now and then TBS or TNT will go on one of their runs when they just alternate playing The Shawshank Redemption and this for two weeks straight.  And whenever they do, I watch White Men Can't Jump until I pass out.  It's not about black or white, it's about green, baby.  We goin' Sizzler, we goin' Sizzler!