He Got Game (1998) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski) and Tuna

The prep star has problems of his own even before the unsolicited and unwanted appearance of his father. He faces the temptations of pro contracts and easy money, as well as all the pressures placed on him by having to choose from a seemingly infinite number of colleges that want him to attend. He also has to deal with scheming friends and relatives who see him as a meal ticket. He Got Game is rich with details about the life of a star high school athlete, and enhances the realism with cameo appearances from dozens of real figures in the worlds of professional and college sports, ranging from Shaq to several famous college coaches to ESPN's Robin Roberts.

The film does not follow any of the sports movie formulas. There is no convenient ending. There is no big game to win at the end. In fact, there is no real competition shown at all, except playground games and a climactic one-on-one between the convict and his son. Although this film takes place in the context of basketball, and was directed by Spike Lee, who is the Knicks' #1 fan and pal to many pro athletes, it's not really a film about basketball at all, but rather about what sports can mean in the lives of young men and their families, centering around the story of an estranged father and son on a rocky path toward reconciliation. For both of these extraordinary men, the dramatic conflict revolves around whether they will learn to "do the right thing."

I think Spike made some mistakes here.

• Ray Allen, a real NBA stud and one of the greatest pure shooters in history (check out his free throw and 3-point shooting percentages), plays the young basketball superstar, and is distractingly stiff in some scenes. He probably should not have been asked to carry as much of the film's dramatic baggage.
• The ending is inappropriately symbolic and mystical after a film which has taken place in the real world. It's sloppily sentimental as well.
• Parts of the story are just plain lacking in credibility.

Set those criticisms aside. I don't want to dwell on the weaknesses of He Got Game because it's a good film which develops both the father's and the son's story in depth and with compassion. As a heartfelt movie about reconciliation, growing up, fathers and sons, and sports, He Got Game is kind of a contemporary urban version of Field of Dreams. The story is imbued with real passion for New York, and for basketball as a cultural touchstone. It is also crafted with love for the medium of film itself. Spike Lee demonstrates great mastery of film as an art form, and blends the elements of color (see the captures below), composition, and music magnificently. In most films, musical montages are gratuitous, but Spike uses them purposefully, to evoke a specific mood and to provide additional meaning that would otherwise take hundreds of words of voice-over.

Spike shares the honors with his ol' reliable stud hoss of an actor, Denzel Washington. What a team they have been! Spike has been known to stray too far from realistic dialogue, and in the hands of lesser actors that can cause a problem with the audience's customary suspension of disbelief, but Denzel is a writer's dream. No matter how bad a line of dialogue may be, Denzel can come up with some way to deliver it so that it seems authentic. If a line seems stilted or artificial, Denzel finds a way to hide it in the character, with irony or posturing or something else that seems genuine in the moment. The man has a gift.

Denzel and Spike? They got game.

When it comes to sports films, basketball is the forgotten stepchild, perhaps because Spike seems to be the only writer/director with a passion for the game. Among the basketball films rated higher than six at IMDb (table below), He Got Game is the best fictional story about the experience of black men playing the urban game. The four highlighted in green below are documentaries, and the four in red are essentially docudramas (my decision to include Coach Carter is debatable). That leaves only two films rated higher than He Got Game: Hoosiers, which is about white Midwesterners; and Love and Basketball, which centers on women's basketball.

I like the way Spike Lee presents a story, and he manages to tell this one with humanity, understanding, and a minimum of cliches. We have the required college visit with sex scene, and every other genre requirement, but Spike knows this world and presents it well, making this a little more authentic than most in the genre.