Gloriosky Road
(…) it was agreed, that my endeavors should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic, yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith.1
From Biographia Literaria
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
I finally watched Glory Road last night. It is notable (so please note it) that I actually saw this movie the same year that it was released, which, for me, is the moral equivalent to being on hand for opening night. As they say,
If it isn’t on videodisk,
It … er, hmm … it might as well be lutefisk.
Plot Synopsis
The movie is based on a true story – retold with a massive amount of poetic license.
Don Haskins goes from coaching high school girls basketball to being in charge of the basketball team at Texas Western. Desperate to create a competing team, he manages to convince seven black players, mostly city kids, to play for him in El Paso. The movie focuses on the molding of the team and on the racial conflicts they encountered. The big payoff is the Miners of Texas Western playing Adolph Rupp’s Kentucky basketball machine for the 1966 NCAA championship and, against overwhelming odds, triumphing.
The Quickie2 Review & Recommendation
- If you demand that your historical facts be handled in a straightforward, balanced manner
- If you are appalled by the manipulative use of any media
- If you like your basketball realistic and stripped to fundamentals
- If you want a realistic slice of life that paints an accurate picture of race relations in the USA of the 1960s
Then, you might as well use your Netflix selection for something other than Glory Road.
On the other hand,
- If you can suspend your cynicism if not your disbelief
- If you need a charge of feel-good
- If you would benefit from being reminded that things have changed for the better in this country’s race relations over the past 40 years (even though it’s taken too long and it hasn’t changed enough)
- If you might get excited by an evocation of the drama of basketball without sweating the details
Then, Glory Road might be just what the DrHGuy ordered.
Glory Road is formulaic (think Hoosiers, Remember The Titans, Rudy), doesn’t miss a cliché (and may have created one or two), and plays fast and loose with historical facts, the rules of basketball, and, occasionally, physics. It also features strong acting, a compelling story (albeit not a historical reenactment), a bit of humor, and, most of all, drama & excitement.
As an added attraction, Glory Road possesses certain positive-deficits; by virtue of its time setting, this is a sports movie that does not subject viewers to a crowd doing “The Wave” or a background rendition of “We Are The Champions.”
Footnotes
- The Coleridge quotation is altogether pertinent to this post. I do admit, however, that I relish the juxtaposition of the slam dunk scene from the movie and STC’s famous suspension of disbelief dictum ~back~
- ”Quickie” here is in reference to DrHGuy prolixity standards ~back~
