The All-Pro Guide to Football Movies

There are two problems with football movies. One, most of them build up to a climactic big-game sequence in which the good-guy team features the racist-bully one and claims the title. Two, the genre lacks a Bull Durham, a movie that depicts the everyday, bourgeois elements of football (e.g., dealing with pear-headed reporters, engaging in spirited bouts of unisyllabic trash-talking) and not its championship moments.

That said, there are more than enough capably assembled gridiron flicks to keep you occupied during the fall’s nine football-free hours per week. Start at the top and work your way down. You won’t regret it...unless you like soccer.

North Dallas Forty (1979)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: In our choice for the greatest football movie yet, a ragtag gang of painkiller aficionados manage to squeeze the occasional forward pass between bouts of womanizing and beering. No, the North Dallas Bulls weren’t based on the Dallas Cowboys of the 1970s. Nope. Not at all.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Seth Maxwell (Mac Davis), whose non-impersonation (wink, wink) of former Cowboys quarterback “Dandy” Don Meredith captures the player’s I-don’t-give-a-s**t flair.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “People who confuse brains and luck can get in a whole lot of trouble.” – Conrad Hunter

Rudy (1993)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: The memorably wee Rudy Ruettiger wants to play for Notre Dame almost as badly as today’s top high-school players don’t want to play for Notre Dame. After winning over dour coaches and oft-concussed teammates alike, he suits up for a game and sacks the quarterback. We’d put “spoiler alert” before that, but come on: If you’re reading this story, you’ve seen Rudy. All together now: Rudy! Rudy! Rudy!

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: The real-life Ruettiger, who appears in a quickie cameo. He spent four years trying to get on the field with Notre Dame and then 18 more attempting to get his story made into a movie. As Boomer Esiason might say, he personifies persistenceness.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You’re five-foot-nothin’, 100-and-nothin’, and you have barely a speck of athletic ability. And you hung in there with the best college football players in the land for two years. And you’re gonna walk outta here with a degree from the University of Notre Dame. In this life, you don’t have to prove nothin’ to nobody but yourself. And after what you’ve gone through, if you haven’t done that by now, it ain’t gonna never happen. Now go on back.” – Fortune

Friday Night Lights (2004)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: The small town of Odessa, TX lives for football, in real life as on the screen. During the year writer/blog-shouter Buzz Bissinger hung around town, the high-school team lost its most electric player to injury. The film chronicles the fallout, both on the field and off.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Charles Billingsley (Tim McGraw). See, it’s possible for a football dad to merely be a dick, as opposed to the embodiment of evil.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Gentlemen, the hopes and dreams of an entire town are riding on your shoulders. You may never matter again in your life as much as you do right now.” – Coach Gaines

The Longest Yard (1974)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Inmates! Guards! Cursing! Arson! Finding The Longest Yard on late-night cable – the original version of the movie, not the flimsy remake – is one of life’s great little joys.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Caretaker (Michael Conrad), one of the few supporting players who is defined by guile rather than borderline psychosis.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “All I’m saying is that you could have robbed banks, sold dope or stole your grandmother’s pension checks and none of us would have minded. But shaving points off of a football game, man, that’s un-American.” – Caretaker

Remember the Titans (2000)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: It reduces race relations to a cliché, as most sports-as-lens-through-which-we-view-society movies do. That said, the message is delivered without frills or obvious lectures, which elevates the film above its ilk.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Coach Herman Boone (Denzel Washington). Come on – it couldn’t be anyone else. The guy practically radiates authority. It’d be interesting to see him take on a role that casts him as an inveterate screw-up.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You take a look at her. ‘Cause once you step on that bus you ain’t got your mama no more. You got your brothers on the team and you got your daddy. You know who your daddy is, dontcha? Gary, if you want to play on this football team, you answer me when I ask you who is your daddy? Who’s your daddy, Gary? Who’s your daddy?” – Coach Boone

All the Right Moves (1983)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: One of the first movies to portray football as a potential means of escape from Nowheretown U.S.A., All the Right Moves scores with its relatively realistic depiction of a dead-end town. It doesn’t hurt that the flick features Tom Cruise before he became TOM F’IN CRUISE and started to feel the need to smile so hard that it hurt.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: The Coach himself, Craig T. Nelson. He plays Coach Nickerson as a guy struggling with some junk of his own, rather than as a bully taking out his frustrations on a bunch of pliable jocks.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “All I have to do is maintain my fantastic 2.0 grade-point average, and everything is cool.” – Brian

Varsity Blues (1999)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: The backup quarterback is always the most popular guy on the team… until the first-stringer goes down. In Varsity Blues, the reluctant second-teamer (James Van Der Beek) sheds his reluctance to lead and takes his team to the – yup – big game. Think Porky’s meets Oxford Blues, but with more cartoonishly super-evil authority figures.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: We can’t give this award to an inanimate object – Ali Larter’s whipped-cream bikini – so how about some props for Billy Bob (Ron Lester), whose fat-ass dumbass transcends any number of good-ol’-boy cliches?

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Billy Bob cried because he’s a bit of a crier, Tweeder drank beer because Tweeder drinks beers, and Kilmer retired, never to coach football again. However, his statue still stands because it was too heavy to move.” – Mox, in voiceover

Paper Lion (1968)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Smarty-pants journalist manages to infiltrate Lions’ camp without the players knowing it, and an entirely predictable Darwinian mauling ensues. It doesn’t hit the highs of George Plimpton’s book of the same name, but Alan Alda manages to make protagonist Plimpton (duh) much more likable than he has any right to be.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Alex Karras, one of many real-world Lions who played themselves in the flick, was such a natural on camera that he was later cast in M*A*S*H, Webster, Porky’s and Blazing Saddles (as Mongo!).

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You try the AFL?” – Vince Lombardi (yeah, that Vince Lombardi)

We Are Marshall (2006)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: After nearly half the Marshall University football team perishes in a plane crash, the survivors pick up the pieces and rebuild the program. Football, it seems, can be quite the balm during trying emotional times.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Everybody here is predictably (and understandably) dour. Let’s just label it a fine team effort and call it an afternoon.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “For those of you who may not know, this is the final resting place for six members of the 1970 Thundering Herd. The plane crash that took their lives was so severe, so absolute, that their bodies were unable to be identified. So they were buried here. Together. Six players. Six teammates. Six Sons of Marshall. This is our past, gentlemen. This is where we have been. This is how we got here. This is who we are.” – Jack Lengyell

Jerry Maguire (1996)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Slick sports agent J.M. finds his conscience, tames a catchphrase-spewing receiver and inherits a stepkid with a melon-shaped head. If you don’t root for things to turn out well for him, you’re either heartless or Mimi Rogers.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Rod Tidwell (Cuba Gooding Jr.), whose acrobatics and swagger elevate the film from the realm of romantic-comedy. Thirteen years after the fact, Gooding’s performance remains that energetic. You can only hold Boat Trip against the guy so much.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “I am out here for you. You don’t know what it’s like to be me out here for you. It is an up-at-dawn, pride-swallowing siege that I will never fully tell you about, okay?” – Jerry Maguire

The Program (1993)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: A screwed-up, big-time college program faces the usual pressures – to win, to help its players read on a third-grade level, etc. At least James Caan adds some bite as the alternately beleaguered and sociopathic coach.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Let’s give it to Steve Lattimer (Andrew Bryniarski), who goes absurdly, wonderfully overboard with his portrayal of a ‘roided-up lineman. Smashing car windows with your head? Them’s a nifty trick.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Hit the tight end so hard his girlfriend dies.” – Alvin Mack

Brian’s Song (1971)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: No blurb can do it justice, so let’s keep ‘er succinct: Brian Piccolo does wind sprints, befriends a more talented player competing for his job and makes us cry. It reminds us manly men that it’s okay to weep hysterically while watching a movie, even one without Sandra Bullock

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Brian Piccolo (James Caan), for deftly mixing the heart with the swagger.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “On Fake Draw Screen Right I pick up the linebacker if he’s comin’. Unless, of course, it’s Butkus, then I simply notify the quarterback to send for a preacher.” – Brian Piccolo

Semi-Tough (1977)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Take away the love triangle and you’ve got a fine football film that focuses on the friendship of two semi-self-aware rakes. The sap takes the edge off the satire and the push-smash footballiness, sadly.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Friedrich Bismarck (Bert Convy), who absolutely lacerates self-help programs with his malicious turn as a touchy-feely guru.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Why are you getting married? Did she knock you up?” – Billy Clyde Puckett

The Replacements (2000)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Scabs! Doing the Electric Slide! Guess what? The motley crew bonds as a team and wins the big game. Never before were we such believers in the power and promise of organized labor as when we left the theater.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Danny Bateman (Jon Favreau), a mellow guy set off by the color red. How he escaped being tagged with the nickname “Bull” during rewrites, we’ll probably never find out.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “I wish I could say something classy and inspirational, but that just wouldn’t be our style… Pain heals. Chicks dig scars. Glory lasts forever.” – Shane Falco

The Remains of the Day (1993)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Oh, there’s football here, alright. EMOTIONAL FOOTBALL. The pained look of longing on Anthony Hopkins’ face during the climactic nobody-kisses-nobody sequence is the stuffy-inner-drama equivalent of Lawrence Taylor mauling Joe Theismann.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Either Hopkins as the butler who can’t love or tackle, or corset-flick mainstay Emma Thompson as the chirpy wench who helps him get in touch with his feelings and break down game-tape of the Bengals. Ah, who’s kidding who? If you gave either of these velly, velly English stars a football they’d probably butter it.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “In my philosophy, Mr. Benn, a man cannot call himself well-contented until he has done all he can to be of service to his employer. Of course, this assumes that one’s employer is a superior person, not only in rank, or wealth, but in moral stature. Now, where the f**k is Tony Dungy?” – James Stevens

Invincible (2006)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Thirty-year-old bartender tries out for the Eagles, makes the team against incredible odds, and recovers a key fumble in a big game. Rocky, what hath thee wrought?

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Janet Cantrell (Elizabeth Banks), the only actor in the film whose Philly accent doesn’t make her sound like a Kentucky native who went to college in Boston. Runner-up: the costumer who tailored the circa-1974 plaid trousers donned by Dick Vermeil (Greg Kinnear).

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “People don’t want heart, Dick. They want wins.” – A.C. Craney

The Last Boy Scout (1991)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: A lousy football flick – though that whole gun-on-the-field doesn’t seem quite as implausible in the wake of L’Affaires Ray Lewis et Marvin Harrison – but a pretty darn OK macho-actioner. “Macho-actioner”… is that a real genre? It is now.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Joe Hallenbeck (Bruce Willis), who takes the down-on-his-luck-scumbag-private-dick cliches and runs with ‘em. Like, from end zone to end zone.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “I think I f**ked a squirrel to death and don’t remember.” – Joe Hallenbeck

Leatherheads (2008)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Just as there’s no crying in baseball, there’s no hugging in football – and this flick, set in the world of 1920s sorta-professional football, makes the tragic mistake of grafting screwball romantic comedy onto the gridiron setting. Shame on everybody involved.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Carter Rutherford (John Krasinski), who manages not to choke on the soggy repartee. Also, he’s a big enough dude to conceivably be a football player. These details aren’t lost on us, Hollywood.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Goddamn rules are ruining this game.” – Jimmy “Dodge” Connelly

Any Given Sunday (1999)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: This is a football movie like the Oakland Raiders are a football team: blustery, loud, and dumb. That Al Pacino’s game-day speech has become a mainstay at NFL stadiums on Sunday afternoon is a commentary on the lack of decent material from which they have to choose. Meanwhile, in the world of Any Given Sunday, teams are awarded seven points for touchdowns. In the non-Oliver Stone, non-conspiratorial real world, teams are awarded six points for touchdowns and then asked to kick the ball through the uprights for a seventh.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Luther “Shark” Lavay (Lawrence Taylor), about the only person in this film who is remotely believable as a football player. This might have something to do with the fact that Mr. Taylor was once, indeed, a football player. Given his legendary off-field exploits, it’s just as easy to buy Taylor taking a circular saw to a teammate’s car.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You find out life’s this game of inches, so is football. Because in either game - life or football - the margin for error is so small. I mean, one half-a-step too late or too early and you don’t quite make it. One half-second too slow, too fast and you don’t quite catch it. The inches we need are everywhere around us. They’re in every break of the game, every minute, every second. On this team we fight for that inch. On this team we tear ourselves and everyone else around us to pieces for that inch. We claw with our fingernails for that inch. Because we know when add up all those inches, that’s gonna make the f**king difference between winning and losing.” – Tony D’Amato

Necessary Roughness (1991)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: After finding themselves on the receiving end of the NCAA’s “death penalty” – no football, no scholarships, no nuthin’ – the Texas State Fightin’ Armadillos start rebuilding the only way a movie team knows how: by assembling a ragtag bunch of has-beens, never-weres and ex-cons. Do they make it to the big game? Do you have to ask?

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Dean Elias (Larry Miller), despite his oft-frustrated schemes to end the Texas State football program and instead spend money on, like, an anthropology department. Miller plays the Dean less as a bully and more as a weasel. Weasels are a lot more fun.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “I don’t wanna put any undue pressure on you guys, but Coach Gennero’s last words were ‘win or I’ll die.’” – Coach Rig

Air Bud: Golden Receiver (1998)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Basketball-playing dog is discovered to have football ability. Hilarity ensues, some of it involving Russian dognappers.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: The dogs (six of ‘em) who play Buddy resist what must’ve been a powerful temptation to strangle themselves with their own leashes. That in itself wins them this coveted honor.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Arf! I have better hands than Braylon Edwards! Arf!” – Buddy

Radio (2003)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: Mentally challenged man hangs around a South Carolina high-school football team in a non-creepy way, toting a radio around while doing so. By virtue of working hard and whatnot, he fills everyone in his path with super-double-reverse-ninja-inspiration. Awww. Advocate groups go bonkers every time a public figure uses the unfortunate and offensive term “retard,” yet they couldn’t be bothered to mobilize themselves to protest Cuba Gooding Jr.’s I AM ACTING SPECIAL! performance in the title role? Hypocrites.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Mama Kennedy (S. Epatha Merkerson), the only actor in this flick who doesn’t drown in its sap.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “That’s a goo’ one!” – James Robert “Radio” Kennedy

Quarterback Princess (1983)

TWO-MINUTE DRILL: This isn’t to say that the biopic of former Rams QB Jim Everett doesn’t accurately depict his struggles to throw the ball to members of his own team, nor his “Chrissy Everett” showdown with TV weasel Jim Rome… What? This movie is about an actual girl quarterback who leads her high-school team to victory and, in the process, gets anointed as homecoming queen? Oh. We probably oughta watch these things before weighing in on them.

THE GAME BALL GOES TO…: Tami Maida (Helen Hunt), who does a more believable impersonation of an athlete than Tim Robbins did in Bull Durham.

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “What bothers you? That I’m a lady or that I’m a quarterback?” – Tami Maida

Black Sunday (1977)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Cancel the Super Bowl? That's like canceling Christmas!” – Joseph Robbie

Everybody’s All American (1988)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “It’s so rough!” – Babs Grey

Heaven Can Wait (1978)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “I’m not supposed to be here” – Joe Pendleton

Lucas (1986)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You can't ever make me quit! EVER!” – Lucas

The Waterboy (1998)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You can do it. Cut his f**king head off!” – Townie

Two-Minute Warning (1976)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “Whatever it is that you want to achieve with your life, common perception is to go for it.” – Mike Ramsay

Wildcats (1986)

HALFTIME SPEECHIFYIN’: “You owe me a new stop watch, you pussies!” – Molly McGrath