'Bowling is a sport too you know...'published at The arts editor's view
Will Gompertz
BBC Arts Editor
The best sports movie by a distance is When We Were Kings, an exquisitely paced documentary following Muhammad Ali’s training camp in Zaire leading up to his fight against George Foreman in 1974: The Rumble in the Jungle.
Second place on the podium of all-time great sports pictures also goes to a doc, Asif Kapadia’s intimate profile of the Brazilian F1 ace Ayrton Senna.
The bronze medal is a photo-finish between American comedies White Men Can’t Jump starring Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes, Caddyshack (you might hate golf but you’ve gotta love Bill Murray), and Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby with a fantastically punchy performance from Hilary Swank.
But wait! Coming up on the rails is that old classic from the same genre (talented female wanting to break into a male-dominated sport) National Velvet with a 12-year old Elizabeth Taylor in the saddle. Sometimes the oldies really are the goldies. But pipping them all to the post and taking the third spot on the podium is not the excellent Gregory’s Girl, or the timeless Chariots of Fire, but the Coen Brother’s surreal beauty The Big Lebowski, because bowling is a sport, too, you know.