Hoosiers DVD + Blu-ray Combo

Hoosiers DVD + Blu-ray Combo Review

It doesn't get more sappy than when one character in this movie says, "Let's win this one for all the small schools who never had a chance to get here." But what of it? I am feeling mighty sentimental today, just the right mood to be in when talking about HOOSIERS, my favorite basketball movie right up until WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP came along. HOOSIERS is one of those movies that, whenever it comes across the television set, I'm compelled to stop and watch the thing There's a reason HOOSIERS placed fourth in the AFI's list of all-time best sports movies.

The story is based on real life events, tweaked for better viewing consumption. Instead of 1954, the film is set in 1951 in the fictional town of Hickory, Indiana. If you're any sort of basketball enthusiast, then you're already clued in that Indiana absolutely reveres its basketball, treats it like religion. Somewhere in Indiana, there's probably an altar dedicated to Steve Alford. Gene Hackman has one of his most ferocious and best ever roles in the highly volatile former college basketball coach Normal Dale. Down to his last chance, Coach Dale drives up to basketball-mad Hickory in 1951 and right away shifts the status quo with his ornery ways (some say, big city ways). Hickory is a tiny town, the high school basketball team comprising only six players and so we immediately regard the Hickory Huskers as extreme long shots.

Everything works with this movie, everything. The story is warm and humorous. The acting is marvelous from Hackman on down. Dennis Hopper as the town drunk who becomes the reluctant assistant coach gets nominated for an Oscar. In a slow burn romance, Barbara Hershey plays the frosty schoolteacher whom Hackman eventually charms (or wears down, anyway). Maris Valainis - who was never much heard from again after this - breathes life and even this mythical aura into Jimmy Chitwood, the boy with few words and the supremely sweet shot. HOOSIERS is a shot of nostalgia, and because it evokes a more innocent era, it could get away with the sentimental stuff. It's cliched now, but those shots of the town faithfully traveling on the road with the team, that was really good.

And perhaps no one moment defines this underdog feel so much as that one which had Ollie, the littlest guy on the team, sinking those two charity shots or, as I like to call it, the Sasha Vujajic Game 7 moment. It's set in stone that the Hickory Huskers will somehow reach the championship game, no surprises there. But the movie is so good at manipulating you that you can't help but get revved up when it all comes down to that last shot for the win, but even before that when, in that tense time out huddle, Jimmy Chitwood looks at the coach and calmly tells him: "I'll make it." In the best tradition of classic feel-good movies, you realize that your strings are being pulled. But that doesn't matter.

Hoosiers DVD + Blu-ray Combo Overview

Studio: Tcfhe/mgm Release Date: 04/06/2010 Rating: R

Hoosiers DVD + Blu-ray Combo Specifications

One of the most rousingly enjoyable sports movies ever made, this small-town drama tells the story of the Hickory Huskers, an underdog basketball team from a tiny Indiana high school that makes it all the way to the state championship tournament. It's a familiar story, but sensitive direction and a splendid screenplay helped make this one of the best films of 1986, highlighted by the superb performances of Gene Hackman as the Huskers' coach, and Oscar nominee Dennis Hopper as the alcoholic father of one of the team's key players. As the drama unfolds we come to realize that many of the characters (including Barbara Hershey as a schoolteacher with whom Hackman falls in love) are recovering from disappointing setbacks, and this depth of character is what makes the otherwise conventional basketball story so richly rewarding. Like Rocky, Rudy, and Breaking Away, this is a quintessentially American movie about beating the odds and rising above one's own limitations. Just try to watch it without cheering! --Jeff Shannon

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