We are in Home Cinema Week, so it seemed appropriate to celebrate the occasion by marrying our festivities with the superb summer of sport we are enjoying in these balmy (perhaps that should be barmy) days of July.
So we took a look at some top sports (and okay, yes, one game) that have featured heavily in movies we have enjoyed over the years. This, as you will see, is an eclectic list, but each entry, we believe, stands up to be counted as a sporting scene, or subject to be revisited.
And please, do feel free to add your own suggestions for your fellow readers’ enjoyment.
Golf: Goldfinger
You all knew it was coming, so we’ll get this one ticked off first. The original James Bond, Sean Connery, made his third outing as 007 in this tale of a megalomaniac industrialist who wants to rob the US’s gold depository at Fort Knox.
Goldfinger was the film where the Bond franchise really got into its stride, with the introduction of the cool gadgets from Q department, and the humour that became one of the series’ trademarks.
And, of course, it has one of the canon’s great henchmen, in the steel-brimmed hat-throwing Odd Job, whom we first meet toting a golf bag for his boss in the money match that Bond and Goldfinger enter into.
(There’s then a lovely example of how times change in what would, in 1964, have been almost unimaginable ways, when Goldfinger apologises to Bond that he is still having to teach Odd Job the niceties of the game as his caddy: “Golf is not yet the national game of Korea, hey?” Well, it pretty much is now…)
The five-minute scene showing their match is a lovely duel of wits between the industrialist and the spy, with verbal feint and counter-feint interspersed with the thud of gold bars hitting the green, the thwack of the ball – and some spectacular cheating all round.
It sets up the relationship between the characters beautifully, and is a lovely example of how they don’t make ’em like they used to – this is a scene given time to breathe by the director. Wouldn’t be allowed now…
Buy the Goldfinger 4K Blu-ray from Amazon
Buy or rent Goldfinger on Apple TV
Baseball: The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!
The Naked Gun took its cue, of course, from the brilliant TV series Police Squad!, which took its cue from Airplane!. There are worse places to seek inspiration.
This type of silly slapstick is commonplace now, of course, but it’s great to look back at the original and find that it can still make you laugh.
Of course you’ve seen it all before, and of course it’s hit and miss, but that’s almost the point. It’s a relentless barrage of verbal and sight gags that simply refuses to pause for breath; and, once the momentum has built up, it proves utterly irresistible.
This scene finds our hero, Frank Drebin (the incomparable Leslie Nielsen), having to take on the role of home-plate umpire in a baseball match in an attempt to foil an assassin’s plot. It is, naturally, utter carnage, extremely silly, and still able to elicit real belly laughs.
From the first strike, when Drebin seems to forget that he is not there only to find the assassin but has to call the game as well, it isn’t long before he is making it all about him, moonwalking down the third-base line, and frisking the players as he goes.
It’s a real joy. “Steee-riiike” indeed.
Buy The Naked Gun 4K Blu-ray from Amazon
Watch The Naked Gun on Amazon Prime Video
Tennis: Strangers on a Train
From the utterly ridiculous to the sublime. This is Hitchcock in peak mid-season form (with apologies to PG Wodehouse, but to continue the sports theme), and one of the master’s movies that film and media schools regularly study.
From the set-up, where professional tennis player Guy (Farley Granger) falls into conversation with charming psychopath Bruno (Robert Walker) on a train, it’s a study in psychology, guilt and ambition. For Bruno proposes that, since it seems they each have someone inconvenient in their lives who would be far better off out of the way, they should swap murders. “Criss-cross”, as Bruno says. That way, there is no motive for the police to follow, and each of them can have a cast-iron alibi.
Guy doesn’t really take things too seriously. But then Bruno carries out his part of the bargain. And he expects Guy to follow suit.
There is an earlier scene at a tennis match, where the crowd’s heads are turning to the left and right in time with the thwack of ball on racket. With one exception, where a man in a fedora is staring across the court. It is truly unsettling, and sets the psychologically dissonant tone of the movie beautifully.
The main tennis scene, though, is near the denouement. Guy is playing a tennis match, while Bruno is desperately trying to retrieve the cigarette lighter from a drain that he intends to plant to mark Guy as a murderer. Guy, then, needs to finish his match as quickly as possible to prevent the unthinkable. Hitchcock’s brilliance as a suspense film-maker is all here: cuts from one protagonist to the other, desperately reaching fingers for the lighter just out of reach. It’s all stress and anxiety – with the music to enhance all those emotions.
Truly a masterful scene from the master of suspense.
Rent or buy Strangers On A Train on Apple TV
Cricket: Fire in Babylon
This astonishing documentary isn’t really about cricket at all. I mean, it is, of course, but it’s about so much more than simply the game. It is without doubt a worthwhile watch even for those who know nothing about the game – it’s certainly a clear example of where sport and politics definitely mixed.
At face value, this is the story of the great West Indies team that dominated world cricket for about two decades from the mid-1970s.
But just a few minutes in, it becomes clear that this, really, is more of a story about societal change and civil rights, both in the West Indies and the UK; the story of former slave colonies breaking out from under the yoke of empire and finally being able to control their own destinies as free men.
And what men.
When you hear the likes of Viv Richards, Gordon Greenidge, Clive Lloyd, Andy Roberts and the incomparable Michael Holding (and many more) explaining just how important the team was to West Indian and black people all around the world, you can see that the cricket wasn’t the main issue here. And they knew it.
From the pummelling the team took against Australia in 1975, via then England captain Tony Greig’s infamous “I intend to make them grovel”, to world domination for years, these men shouldered the responsibility for the pride of more than a nation – for West Indians everywhere.
And, because it’s the West Indies we’re talking about here, the soundtrack is also a wonderful collection of calypso, ska and reggae tracks – indeed, Bunny Wailer is also a prominent interviewee.
It’s a bit tricky to get hold of at the moment, although it is available to stream with a bit of a search – and you can buy the DVD or Blu-ray, of course.
I urge you to make the effort. This is a fascinating, sobering, yet uplifting documentary that highlights hugely significant societal change; and, much as I love cricket, it’s that that makes it so important.
Buy the Fire In Babylon Blu-ray on Amazon
Football: Marvellous
This Bafta-winning drama, based on the true story of Stoke City's beloved kit-man, Neil "Nello" Baldwin, again takes the sport as the hook, but is actually about so much more. Neil, superbly played by Toby Jones, is a man with learning disabilities – not that he acknowledges that himself. He simply refuses to let life get him down.
The film is both sentimental and remarkably profound at the same time. Fairly early on in the film, for example, Neil says: “I always wanted to be happy. So I decided to be.” Easier said than done for most of us; but for Neil, it’s his way of life.
Neil, a Stoke City fan, has the almost unbelievable knack of making friends, or at the very least acquaintance, with some of the great and good, from all spheres of society: to which end he finds himself on the umpire’s boat at the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race; archbishops and senior politicians all fall under his spell; and, most importantly for Neil, so did Lou Macari, Manchester United legend, and (soon into the movie) newly appointed manager of Stoke City FC.
Macari ends up employing Neil as the kit man for the squad, seemingly on a whim; but it soon becomes clear to the manager that Neil offers his squad far more than simply clean kit.
The joy of this movie is its simplicity, and the almost unbelievable situations in which Neil finds himself. And yet, as the various cameo appearances in the film confirm, all of this really happened.
Lou Macari, Gary Lineker, former top-level referee Uriah Rennie, and circus ringmaster Norman Barrett (sorry, I hadn’t mentioned that Neil was also “Nello”, a circus clown) all make appearances, as does Neil himself, to reassure Toby Jones that it all happened just as he is depicting it.
It’s a charming, moving, funny film that is all the more affecting because it’s true. A real delight.
Buy the Marvellous Blu-ray from Amazon
Stream Marvellous on Amazon Prime Video
Fencing: The Princess Bride
I admit some bias here. The Princess Bride is one of my top five favourite movies, and it’s our family film. It merits its place in a list of movies with great sporting scenes and connections because of the epic fencing duel between country-boy Westley, played by Carey Elwes, and Mandy Patinkin’s swordsman Inigo Montoya.
The movie plot is a film within a film, with a sick little boy (Fred Savage from The Wonder Years) being read a story by his grandfather (Peter Falk). And then, a couple of quick interjections apart, we get on with the fairy tale. There are wonderful cameo performances from the likes of Billy Crystal, Peter Cook and Mel Smith, and it’s a great tale that will (genuinely) delight young and old.
One of the standout scenes, though, is the duel between two of the heroes of the story. It’s a beautifully choreographed set piece that brings to mind Robin Hood from 1938, starring Errol Flynn and Basil Rathbone. Athletic, good-humoured and genuinely impressive, this is a hugely entertaining tussle, with dialogue to match – “I know something you don’t know.”
And it’s one of the most memorable scenes in a movie full of memorable scenes. Inconceivable though that may sound.
Buy The Princess Bride Blu-ray from Amazon
Rent or buy The Princess Bride from Apple TV
Poker: Casino Royale
We top and tail our list with Bond, without apology. It might not be a sport, but Texas Hold ’em is a hugely televised game that, therefore, merits its place on this list.
This scene is classic Bond (see Goldfinger above) with Bond meeting his protagonist in public. This time, rather than the golf course, it’s the casino where our two stags butt heads. And this time it’s nearer the end of the movie than the beginning.
Anyone who knows anything about poker will know that the hands being dished out to these guys are completely insane – many millions to one against, etc – but that’s hardly the point. There is much shuffling of chips, many bold stare-downs, a slew of sardonic smiles and plenty of tension-filled pauses. Just what you want, then, in your Bond movie.
In many ways, it is similar to the Goldfinger golf match: the scene is granted time to play out in a way that has been increasingly rare in this era of jump cuts and incessant action – and it feels all the better for it.
Mads Mikkelsen gives us a glimpse of the Hannibal Lecter to come in his portrayal of Le Chiffre, and Daniel Craig, in his first outing as 007, proves all the doubters over his casting well and truly wrong.
This is classic Bond. Just don’t expect your own hands of hold ’em with your mates ever to come out like that.
Buy the Casino Royale 4K Blu-ray from Amazon
Rent or buy Casino Royale from Apple TV
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