Jeffrey Overstreet talks about sports-and-faith movies in relation to the recent film When the Game Stands Tall. He says movies of this type usually reinforce bad ideas and behaviors.
“It’s a simple formula,” he says. “Show that winning and losing is fraught with trouble if the game is played for the wrong reasons (for glory, for money, for self-gratification). Then show the athletes learning some Sunday school lessons about humility and teamwork. And once they’ve learned those lessons, then give the audience the satisfaction of seeing those who are In The Right achieve personal victories (reconciling the family, winning the virtuous but skeptical girl, overcoming the bullies)… and, usually, scoreboard victories as well.”
The story easily preaches that good guys or the faithful will win, and God will win it for you, supporting the common belief that a good life with earn good rewards. There’s truth there, but when life gets hard or unjust, then we will crumble if our faith is in this formula, not the living God. I think the church in America needs the backbone that would come from knowing God is faithful even when we don’t win.
Jeff offers a good list of ideas he would like to see challenged in a movie about sports:
- “how the commercialization of sports ends up encouraging lifestyles that are the antithesis of teamwork, health, and wholeness;
- how money corrupts the whole enterprise, from outrageous salaries to the excesses of the circuses that tend to surround professional sports events;
- how sports culture glorifies youth, and finds little of value in the experience of aging, so that athletes vanish from the national stage once they are too old to dominate the stage (unless they have enough charisma to become part of the youth-worshipping media machine);
- how “fan spirit” usually devolves into tribalism.”
That’s only half of his list. Have you seen this movie? What did you think of it? If you like, share your thoughts on other sports-themed movies.
I saw When the Game Stands Tall and liked it (my review is here). My husband, who likes “faith movies” as little as I do, also liked it a lot.
I like Jeffrey Overstreet and I can see why he thought this movie was a good launching pad for his problems with sports movies. However, it would’ve been nice if he’d have seen it before using that particular piece’s name to hang all his complaints on. At least he put one positive critic alongside those who didn’t like it.
There is a general tendency to dislike a certain type of movie if you are a film critic and I hate that I have to include some of my favorite critics in this group. I knew how critics would react to this movie when I left the screening. Secretariat was also just such a movie, derided as sentimental and predictable and a bit old fashioned. We loved it, even my cynical 20-something kids. Oh, wait, and Roger Ebert loved it too. Because he didn’t let the fact that something was a bit old fashioned and possibly sentimental get in the way of enjoying a truly told tale.
Thanks, Julie.