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Film Reviews

The Damned United & A Handful Of Non-Shit Sports Films
Taylor Parkes , March 24th, 2009 11:25

The Damned United is a lightweight version of David Peace's dark character study of football manager Brian Clough. Taylor Parkes picks apart this flawed football flick. Plus Jeremy Allen compiles a gallery of 10 sports films that weren't shit.

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Lagaan

Some sports are impossible to make movies about. Blackball, a comedy starring Paul Kaye as a West country tearaway with a gift for bowling predictably blows, as does Match Point, Woody Allen's take on tennis, the director ends up ripping off the plot-line from his own superior Crimes and Misdemeanors. Cricket, you would think, is one of those sports, and yet surprisingly there is a wonderfully charming movie out there all about the noble past-time, and even more surprisingly it is a Bollywood musical set in 19th Century India. Lagaan explores the familiar sport-related theme of overcoming seemingly the impossible, this time to the thud of leather on wood, and clocking in at three hours it is a deceptively easy ride. Sticking it up the Raj never felt so good.