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100 Greatest Sports Films of All-Time |
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Sports Films are those that have a sports setting (football or baseball stadium, arena, or the Olympics, etc.), competitive event (the 'big game,' 'fight,' or 'competition'), and/or athlete (boxer, racer, surfer, etc.) that are central and predominant in the story. Dramatic sports films or biographies have created memorable portraits of all-American sports heroes, individual athletes, or teams who are faced with tough odds in a championship match, race or large-scale sporting event, soul-searching or physical/psychological injuries, or romantic sub-plot distractions. Fictional sports films normally present a single sport (the most common being baseball, football, basketball, and boxing), and include the training and rise (and/or fall) of the underdog or champion in the world of sports. Sports films may be fictional or non-fictional; and they are a hybrid sub-genre category, although they are often one of the following:
Sports should play a predominant role in a 'true' sports film. The most popular sports themes in Hollywood films of the 20th-21st centuries appear to be auto-racing, American football, boxing, baseball, horse-racing and basketball in a plentiful selection of films. Track and field, golf, ice hockey, soccer and wrestling have also proven to be popular sports themes. See also AFI's 10 Top 10 - The Top 10 Sports Films. More About Sports Films:
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 Introduction to the Sports Films Genre |
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The linked titles below refer to reviews (with screenshots) in the "Greatest Moments and Scenes" section of the site |
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 The Freshman (1925) |
 The Champ (1931) |
 Horse Feathers (1932) |
 Olympia (1938, Germ.) |
 Knute Rockne All American (1940) |
 Gentleman Jim (1942) |
 The Pride of the Yankees (1942) |
 National Velvet (1944) |
 Body and Soul (1947) |
 Champion (1949) |
 The Set-Up (1949) |
 The Jackie Robinson Story (1950) |
 Angels in the Outfield (1951) |
 Pat and Mike (1952) |
 The Harder They Fall (1956) |
 Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956) |
 Fear Strikes Out (1957) |
 The Hustler (1961) |
 Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962) |
 This Sporting Life (1963, UK) |
 The Endless Summer (1966) |
 Grand Prix (1966) |
 Paper Lion (1968) |
 Downhill Racer (1969) |
 The Great White Hope (1970) |
 Brian's Song (1971) |
 On Any Sunday (1971) |
 Fat City (1972) |
 Bang the Drum Slowly (1973) |
 The Longest Yard (1974) |
 Rollerball (1975) |
 The Bad News Bears (1976) |
 The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings (1976) |
 Rocky (1976) |
 One on One (1977) |
 Pumping Iron (1977) |
 Semi-Tough (1977) |
 Slap Shot (1977) |
 Big Wednesday (1978) |
 Breaking Away (1979) |
 North Dallas Forty (1979) |
 CaddyShack (1980) |
 Raging Bull (1980) |
 Chariots of Fire (1981, UK) |
 Victory (1981) (aka Escape to Victory) |
 Personal Best (1982) |
 That Championship Season (1982) |
 All the Right Moves (1983) |
 Heart Like a Wheel (1983) |
 Phar Lap (1983, Australia) |
 The Karate Kid (1984) |
 The Natural (1984) |
 Vision Quest (1985) |
 The Color of Money (1986) |
 Hoosiers (1986) |
 Bull Durham (1988) |
 Eight Men Out (1988) |
 Everybody's All-American (1988) |
 Field of Dreams (1989) |
 Kickboxer (1989) |
 Major League (1989) |
 Days of Thunder (1990) |
 A League of Their Own (1992) |
 The Mighty Ducks (1992) |
 White Men Can't Jump (1992) |
 Cool Runnings (1993) |
 Rudy (1993) |
 The Sandlot (1993) |
 Blue Chips (1994) |
 Hoop Dreams (1994) |
 Kingpin (1996) |
 Space Jam (1996) |
 Tin Cup (1996) |
 When We Were Kings (1996) |
 He Got Game (1998) |
 Without Limits (1998) |
 Any Given Sunday (1999) |
 For Love of the Game (1999) |
 The Hurricane (1999) |
 Mystery, Alaska (1999) |
 Bring It On (2000) |
 Love & Basketball (2000) |
 Remember the Titans (2000) |
 Ali (2001) |
 Bend It Like Beckham (2002, UK) |
 The Rookie (2002) |
 Seabiscuit (2003) |
 Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004) |
 Friday Night Lights (2004) |
 Million Dollar Baby (2004) |
 Miracle (2004) |
 Cinderella Man (2005) |
 Invincible (2006) |
 The Wrestler (2008) |
 Invictus (2009) |
 The Fighter (2010) |
 Moneyball (2011) |
 42 (2013) |
 Creed (2015) |
 McFarland, USA (2015) |
The
100 Greatest Sports Films of All-Time