Five MOMENTOUS Stars!! A Great Movie!! "Glory Road" tells the true story, with much dramatic license along the way, of one of sport's greatest moments. A moment that changed the face and color of college basketball and rippled across all sports. It's the story of a little known college basketball coach, Don Haskins, and how he came to be the coach of little known Texas Western College in El Paso, Texas. It's also the story of the black players who would be recruited from all around the USA to eventually wind up playing in one of the greatest moments in college basketball: David "Daddy D" Lattin, Nevil Shed, Willie Cager, Orsten Artis, "Wee" Willie Worsley, Harry Flournoy, and of course the late floor general, Bobby Joe Hill. And the other team members played their vital roles also: Jerry Armstrong, Louis Baudoin, Dick Meyers, Togo Railey and David Palacio. Producer Jerry Bruckheimer does a wonderful job of bringing back the singular moment of the all-white Kentucky team under Adolph Rupp (Jon Voigt is a hoot in this role) and Haskin's all-black starting five meeting in the NCAA basketball national championship final game spotlight during some tough racial times for the USA. In fact, Haskins had played this combination of players many times before during the season to little local fanfare, so it was no big deal to him. He just wanted to win. Josh Lucas is great as Don "The Bear" Haskins in this excellent James Gartner-directed movie. It's said that Lucas, in preparing for this role, was driven out into the desert by Haskins in his truck and they just sat and talked (and drank) for many hours discussing how Haskins did it and the way he did it. (This has turned into quite a good friendship since then.) The movie pre-screenings, with all of the living original players on hand, in El Paso are greatly appreciated by all of us who lived through those incredible times and are still here.
In light of today's social freedoms, the movie does a great job of depicting the tough racial times of the 1960's and the events that put Haskins, the team, and TWC on the athletic map forever. Not to mention the huge pot of money that TWC got from participating in the tournament. Shortly after these events, the University of Texas education system made TWC a full partner by the redesignation of the "University of Texas-El Paso" and a boatload of construction/faculty money flowed from Austin to El Paso. I was there and it was a grand moment to be remembered. A great must-see movie not just for the sports but also for the social impact of those times. Hats off again to Jerry Bruckheimer for personally carrying the banner on the national-level TV and radio shows promoting this movie. Five "Slam-Dunking" Stars.
(Notes:
*"Glory Road" won the "ESPY" Award as the Best Sports Movie of 2006.
*The Texas Western College NCAA Championship team was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2007.)
Glory Road is the true story of Texas college basketball coach Dan Haskins.
In 1965, white players dominated college basketball and a predominantly black team was just not even thought of, especially in Klan infested Southern states.
The coach assists his Texas-Western players in breaking down race relation obstacles still grasping the nation and even more brazenly evident in violent Jim Crow South.
Coach Haskins drives all his players, both on the court, and demands more then passing academic grades in the classroom as well.
Classic Soul and R & B music of the mid-1960's era play a key part through out this well made picture.
"The incredible story of the team that changed the game forever / Based on a true story"
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"Glory Road" tells the story of the Texas Western Miners, a college basketball team who won the NCAA Championship in 1966. But this wasn't just an ordinary championship, no, for the starting line-up in the championship game was all Black players, a thing that was unheard of in '66. Or better yet, even a black player being recruited by a college team was out of the ordinary. However, the 36 year old coach Don Haskins recruited seven Black players for his Texas Western team (when the season begins, he starts three of those players). The team was barely even thought of in the college world before then, then with the help of the seven black players, they went on to win the championship.
The movie opens with a girls basketball game, and you see that Don Haskins coaches girl's basketball. Later on, he is asked to coach Division 1 basketball, for the Texas Western team (with one drawback; he would have to live in the dorm room with his wife and kids). Then, he sets out to recruit players that would help the team win. When he recruits all Black players, it's obvious that most people (even the Black players themselves) thought Haskins was crazy. Among the players he recruited were Bobby Jo Hill (played exceptionally by Derek Luke), Willie Cager, David Lattin, and Harry Flournoy. His practices for the team were intense and his rules were strict. This would all pay off in the end though, with the Miners winning the championship over Adolf Rupp's Kentucky Wildcats (with Pat Riley, who is a character in the movie, it's weird to hear his name called while he's playing, knowing he's a game-winning coach with plenty of rings).
The movie does depict the racism at the time as well. It wasn't an easy ride for the coach or the Black players on the team. In the first game, the fans clapped for the two starting white players, but the whole arena was quiet when the Black players were announced. The team had racial slurs written in their hotel room during their game. One player was even beat up in a bathroom. Haskins was harassed as well. The racism almost tore the team apart, but with the coach's help they stayed together and changed the course of basketball.
All around, the acting was great. Josh Lucas did a great job as Coach Haskins, completely becoming his character. Derek Luke did great as Bobby Jo Hill. Jon Voight played Kentucky coach Adolf Rupp, but you wouldn't really know unless you read the credits. Nonetheless he did a great job. Mehcad Brooks, Sam Jones III, Schin A.S. Kerr and Damaine Radcliff (who played Flournoy, Worsley, Lattin, and Cager, respectively) all did excellent in their roles. The actors practically become the players. The cast couldn't have been better.
Overall, Disney has released another superb movie about sports underdogs winning it all (I enjoyed Remember The Titans as well). If you like that movie, there's no way you'll dislike this. It is a well-cast, well-directed movie that will satisfy any basketball fan, and will keep everyone watching. It's been said that it follows the cliches of all other similar movies, but don't we always watch them anyway?
The film triumphantly shows how one coach changed the game (and face) of basketball completely. One quote from the film is "You're acting like negroes are gonna be the future of basketball!" and I couldn't help but laugh when that line was said. The importance and significance of that season and the tribulations of the team is wonderfully shown. Don't pass this up.
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From the powerful "Hoosiers" to last year's excellent "Coach Carter," we have witnessed a number of basketball films in which a coach takes command of a team of underdogs, nourishes their skills through a rough season, and takes them all the way to the Big Game. In short, you have seen "Glory Road" before, even if you haven't purchased a ticket yet.
You are familiar with all of the cliches: the coach, and the players, face hardships on and off the courts, moments of in-game suspense are established by slow-motion, and the ending is so foreseen that you can bet your life on what will happen. But somewhere between the first scene and the end credits, I forgot that I had seen this done before, and I left the theater inspired.
"Glory Road" tells the story of Texas Western University's 1966 championship victory over the intimidating Kentuky Wildcats and the journey they took to get there. The newly hired coach, Don Haskins (Josh Lucas), takes a bold step in hiring a number of black players, all of whom, he believes, are undiscovered talent waiting to be put in the spotlight. It was this move that began to breakdown the racial barriers not just in the NCAA, but in the United States, and the segregation issues that existed in that time are heavily studied in a number of the film's sequences.
First, there is the matter of the players already playing for Texas Western, who must accept the presence of their new teammates. Then there is the matter of school officials, who, naturally, find Haskins' methods of recruiting unorthodox. Finally, there are the opinions of the media, who will find it insane that that Haskins would recruit talented black players and, eventually, start five black players in the national championship game.
But the aspects of the players is not what makes "Glory Road" an excellent film. What makes this an excellent film is that we get to know the players, their struggles, and their personal histories; the well coreographed game scenes that accurately portray what actually happened during the games are more like extra goodies. Chief among the new players are Bobby Joe Hill (Derek Luke) and Willie Scoops Cager (Damaine Radcliff), who introduce a new style of basketball that would later become an influence to the modern principles of the sport. Their style conflicts with the style that Haskins believes in, and in one memorable scene, when his team his down, he orders Hill to play the game his way and they arise victorious.
Another key character is Kentuky head coach Adolph Rupp, an inspired and firey performance by John Voight. He knows that Texas Western is making history as they progress through the season and into the championship game, which he why refers to them as "a special team" during one of his timeouts. Given the historical context of his first name in relationship to racism, you would think that "Glory Road" establishes him as a villain, but it doesn't. The film just sits back and observes the arrogance of Rupp and other individuals during that time who were rooting for Kentuky just because Haskins had black players on his team. The film doesn't pick sides. It presents both of them, so graphically in one scene that it pushes the barriers of the PG rating. It's not being biased in favor of the black players. It paints an honest portrait of what happened.
The performances are excellent, with Josh Lucas playing Coach Haskins in a role that should be talked about for a while. However, the film's spirit doesn't totally lie in the powerful depiction of it's characters, but in what happens after the events of the story, and most of it's awesomeness comes out of what we know now. If there wasn't a Coach Haskins who recruited a Bobby Joe Hill, then there would have probably never been a Michael Jordan, a Lebron James, or an Allen Iverson. "Glory Road" is inevitably a valuable history lesson, which we are still learning in our society today, and like "Crash," it establishes the lesson by showing victimization and antagonization.
I suppose that's what sets "Glory Road" apart from most other sports films: the race relationship is just as important as the game. Making ends meet through a checklist of sports cliches, director James Gartner and screenwriters Christopher Cleveland and Bettina Gilois deserve much respect for what they have accomplished. But the film makes a very haunting point in its context. Although its amazing how far we have come in the past forty years in race relations, we still have a long way to go. Isaac
Rated PG; 106 minutes; Directed James Gartner
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"Glory Road" is the story of what some have called the most important game in basketball history: The 1966 NCAA Championship game between the Texas Western Miners, coached by Don Haskins, and the Kentucky Wildcats, coached by veteran Adolph Rupp. The game's significance was that all of the Miners who played in that game were black. Never before had so many black players been seen on an NCAA court at one time. And they won. This created a lot of opportunity for black college athletes, particularly in the South, and changed the way people play basketball. "Glory Road" focuses on coach Don Haskins' (Josh Lucas) efforts to build a great team at Western Texas College (now UTEP) and the struggles of the black athletes to win respect while they were constantly gibed and occasionally threatened. Eager for the opportunity to coach a Division One team after succeeding with girls' high school basketball, Coach Haskins moves his family into the Texas Western men's dorm and sets about recruiting some good players -only to find that his budget was insufficient to lure any coveted athletes. But other schools are not courting black players. So Haskins scours the nation, from junior colleges to urban streets, to find great players. He ends up with a team of 7 black and 5 white athletes in whom to instill his ideas about "fundamental, disciplined, defensive basketball."
"Glory Road" is shot is a naturalistic, unrefined style bordering on cinema verite and conveys a strong sense of the mid-1960s culture in which the events take place. Natural, directional light, which tends to be high-contrast, and a muted color palette combine to make a distinctive visual style. It's a wonder that the style is as consistent as it is, since cinematographer John Toon shot half the movie before having to quit due to illness and was replaced by Jeffrey Kimball. Both of these cinematographers deliver a consistent and appropriate visual style for first-time director James Gartner. The film focuses on Coach Haskins and the Miners team that won the 1966 Championship. The legendary Don Haskins was more of a disciplinarian and also more of a rogue than we see in the film. He hustled pool to fund those recruiting trips. Josh Lucas brings an intensity, energy, and amiability to the role. Although we know something of the players' backgrounds, the focus is greater on the black players than the white, and even then it is cursory. The film is more about the obstacles that black players faced than about the players themselves. There are several nice supporting performances, but John Voight's turn as Coach Rupp is particularly memorable.
The DVD (Disney 2006): Bonus features include 4 deleted scenes (7 min), 3 featurettes, a music video for "Sweet Music" by Alicia Keys (2 min), and 2 audio commentaries. "Legacy of the Bear" (13 min) is about Coach Haskins' long career at Texas Western/UTEP (1962-1999) including interviews with Don Haskins and wife Mary, some of his players, biographer Ray Sanchez, et al. "In Their Own Words: Remembering 1966" (23 min) is about the 12-man 1965-1966 Miners team. Interviews with Harry Flournoy, David Lattin, Nevil Shed, Willie Worsley, Dick Myers, Togo Railey, Orsten Artis, Louis Baudoin, Don Haskins, and Pat Riley, who was on the opposing Kentucky team in 1966. In "Surviving Practice" (4 min), Tim Hardaway talks about coaching the actors. The first audio commentary is by director James Gartner, who discusses what elements of the film are literal and what has been fictionalized, casting, his intentions in various scenes, what was included, what was left out, and why. The second audio commentary is by the writing team of Christopher Cleveland and Bettina Gilois, who provide additional information about Don Haskins, discuss input they got from the players and the purpose behind some of the scenes they wrote. Captioning for the films is available in English. Subtitles and dubbing are available in French and Spanish.
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Lighten up, fellow reviewers! ANGER MANAGEMENT is lighthearted comedy--not neurosurgery. I had zero expectations going into this movie, but as soon as the hilarious plane scene unfolded I found myself watching with an ear-to-ear grin on my mug.
