Formulaic...but in a good way.

Rating: 8/10 (19 March 2012)

The film begins with the hiring of a new high school basketball coach (Gene Hackman) in a rural Indiana town in 1951. Despite the townsfolk loving basketball (after all, it IS Indiana), the people really aren't that friendly. They try to tell him how to coach and some of his players have major attitudes as well. It's easy to say that it's a downright unfriendly place for outsiders. However, being a movie, you figure things must change...otherwise it wouldn't make for an interesting film! Into this enjoyable but predictable formula, fortunately, you have a lot of great characters. There is the nice but sick Principal, the teacher who initially hates the coach (Barbara Hershey) and, the most interesting of all, an alcoholic who is actually hired to be the coach's assistant (Dennis Hopper). All of these, along with lovely writing and a strong attention to 1950s details, make this an inspiring and impressive film.
I wish all basketball players were forced to watch this game today. It has a lot to say about the game, self-discipline, self-respect and teamwork. So, even thought today's players are probably a lot better than those back in the old days (they are a lot bigger and stronger, that's for sure), they still have a lot to learn.
As you watch the film, you need to keep reminding yourself that basketball was MUCH different back in the 50s. There was no shot clock and games OFTEN had total scores below 60...or even 40! So, the Coach's insistence on passing, passing, passing is pretty consistent with the way the game was played at the time--sort of like playing keep-away with occasional shots. So, actually, while the game seems kind of slow in this film, it's really a lot faster than they usually played it back then. They also seemed to have a lot more fights in the film than they probably had in real life.
Recently another film was made that was clearly patterned on "Hoosiers" ("The Winning Season"). However, this newer clearly ignored the positive lessons of "Hoosiers" and is a funny film...though I clearly would NOT want to have a real coach be THAT awful! Well worth seeing...sort of an "Anti-Hoosiers"!
One of the best films of the genre.