From: leeper@cbnewsj.cb.att.com (mark.r.leeper)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies
Subject: WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP
Date: 9 Apr 92 14:36:19 GMT
Organization: AT&T


			     WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP
		       A film review by Mark R. Leeper

	  Capsule review:  Occasionally very funny dialogue is not
     enough to rescue a story about the lives of two basketball
     hustlers who basically live for the game.  The story off the
     court is basically pointless and has holes large enough to
     stuff a basketball through.  Rating: -1 (-4 to +4).  (After
     the review is a spoiler section listing plot absurdities.)

     Billy Hoyle (played by Woody Harrelson)  is a natural basketball
player.  The game is his whole life.  And he has a natural advantage.  Billy
is white and, as the title suggests, everybody thinks only blacks can be
good at basketball.  One day Billy hustles Sidney Dean (played by Welsey
Snipes), who is also a part-time hustler.  Sidney suggests that the two of
them join up as a hustling team.  Each needs money.  Dean has a wife and son
and a semi-legal part-time job that does not pay enough.  Hoyle is on the
run from two thugs because--are you ready for a twist?--he failed to throw a
game after he'd told some gamblers he would.  Billy has a girlfriend also,
who spends her day memorizing trivia facts in the hopes that someday she
will be on JEOPARDY.  The hustle has Sidney offering to play two-on-two
playground basketball and his opponents can choose any partner for Sidney
they want.  Sure enough, they always pick the white guy with the stupid look
on his face.

     So what we have here is a black and white male bonding film.  We see in
great detail how the two get along, how they occasionally don't get along,
and how basketball conquers all.  We see how each relates to "his woman."
When things get dull the wise and wordly Sidney gives Billy some fatherly
advice like "listen to your woman."  And there is genuine pathos as we learn
Billy's terrible secret that being white, he just does not have the talent
to slam-dunk the basketball.  (Spoiler: guess what happens in the climactic
scene of the film?  And in slow motion, yet.)

     WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP was written and directed by Ron Shelton.  Shelton
previously did the nice BULL DURHAM and the very good BLAZE.  While some of
the basketball photography is okay, in terms of dramatic tension it
degenerates into the cliche of slow motion photography.  Only the rapid-fire
insult-trashings on the court give the film interest value.  This one is
skippable.  I would give it a -1 on the -4 to +4 scale.

Spoilers:

     Plot problems:

  1.  So what if a security guard for JEOPARDY owes a favor?  How does that
      get a contestant on the show?
  2.  Why did just the right question categories show up on JEOPARDY?
      Another security guard favor?  Not likely.
  3.  On JEOPARDY you have to wait until a question is read before you can
      hit the button.
  4.  No organized crime enforcer is stupid enough to fake having killed
      someone to fulfill a contract.  It is a really good way to get
      yourself killed if anyone sees the victim still alive.
  5.  The bet is that you are to play against Sidney and one other person of
      your choice.  This guy over to your left owes you money.  On your
      right is your best friend since second grade.  Then there's the kid
      with the missing arm.  And that one over there can't dribble a
      basketball without tripping.  There is a seven-year-old watching
      behind the fence.  And over there is a tall, athletic white dude,
      somewhat nerdy, whom you've never seen before.  Which one *wouldn't*
      you pick?  Ever?  But if the hustle doesn't work the whole film makes
      no sense.

					Mark R. Leeper
					att!mtgzy!leeper
					leeper@mtgzy.att.com
					Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper
Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies