There’s not much to add to this mashup of big coach pep talks from various sports movies like Miracle, Hoosiers, Varsity Blues, Remember The Titans, and We Are Marshall. If you don’t get goosebumps, then you probably never will.
I nearly punched a hole in my monitor the first time I saw this, but it wasn’t because of the adrenaline. It’s because I really hate Dennis Quaid. Well done, Screen Junkies. Well done, indeed.
When Hollywood studios aren’t insulting us with films based on Candyland and Where’s Waldo?, they’re making terrible sports movies about dogs that can play football and Freddie Prinze Jr. throwing like Jim Abbott’s niece. And the latest sports-related movie idea receiving a green light is the Madden Curse. That’s right, EA is making a movie about a running joke based on coincidence. Why not?
So is this film going to be professional football’s Final Destination, as some magical force stalks elite players, ending their careers in their prime? No. Not at all. Instead, it will focus on a retired video game champion. Seriously.
Specific details concerning the plot remain sketchy, but EA VP Pat O’Brien reportedly said, “The story will follow a former ‘Madden’ video game champion who is forced out of retirement just as he finds himself on the corner of the game’s cover — and subject to the curse.” (Via Switched)
Hold on, the guy comes out of retirement because for some reason EA put him on the cover of Madden? The Madden Curse involves active players who have stellar, MVP-type seasons only to be injured the next season and never play at that elite level again. So why does the guy come out of retirement? Is he afraid that he’ll break his thumbs in a freak Call of Duty accident? Perhaps the main character could spend the entire film insisting that he’ll stay retired but then unretiring. And he can text a picture of his penis to Olivia Munn. Lord knows I’d like to.
A look back at the history of the Madden Curse after the jump…
We like to keep the actual bad news to a minimum around these parts of the interwebs, and it sucks to come back from a wonderful Andre Johnson uppercut of a four-day weekend with a sad story, but we can’t control the news… yet. Actor Leslie Nielsen passed away yesterday at 84 of complications from pneumonia. While this may seem like news more suited for part-time bullfighting enthusiast Vince and FilmDrunk, we wanted to pay respect to Nielsen’s contributions to the sports world as well.
Despite his roles in terrible spoofs like 2001: A Space Travesty, Superhero Movie, and two of the Scary Movie sequels, sadly among many others, Nielsen will thankfully always be Lt. Frank Drebin, Police Squad. Growing up, Naked Gun and Airplane! had huge impacts on my sense of humor, as I’m sure they did for the majority of people in our generation. The Naked Gun franchise gave us OJ Simpson, Reggie Jackson trying to kill the Queen of England, and Priscilla Presley’s stuffed beaver. Most of all, Nielsen gave us a terrible umpire, the best worst National Anthem of all-time, and the most reusable comedy quotes before Anchorman was even a drop from Will Ferrell’s pen. And I can’t wait for Spring Training to go to a game and yell, “Hey! It’s Enrico Palazzo!” one more time.
In the meantime, we can remember his contributions to sports comedy…
It was bad enough that Joe Montana had to beat my Bengals in the Super Bowl (twice, even). Now he has to ruin one of the greatest sports films ever made. Montana was asked earlier in the week about the film Rudy, which was based on a true story that happened while Montana was at Notre Dame.
Well, the crowd wasn’t chanting. No one threw in their jerseys. He did get in the game. He got carried off [at the end of] the game. [...] Back then they tried to play someone at the end of [the season] that all the seniors could get in the last home game. The schedule was kind of set that way.
So he got in. He did get a sack. And then the guys carried him off, just playing around. I won’t say it was a joke, but it was playing around. He worked his butt off to get where he was and to do the things he did. But not any harder than anyone else. –Dan Patrick, via Doc Sat.
The jerseys thing was old news–the real “Rudy”, Daniel Ruettiger, said as much on his website. But Montana’s account of Ruettiger being carried off the field already has been refuted by a teammate that was there. Whether it was the case or not, Rudy remains one of the great Little White Guy That Could movies ever. And if you don’t cry at the end of that film, then you have no soul. Or maybe you’re just really, really dehydrated. Either way, I don’t think we can be friends.
With saving the other half of his face for future tattooing, former undisputed heavyweight champ and basket case cum laude Mike Tyson has been working on a film of his life’s story, specifically discussing the project with leading man Jamie Foxx. From the New York Daily News:
The troubled ex-champ told a Las Vegas newspaper that he has had talks with Foxx about a movie and predicted the flick will happen within two years.
“Jamie Foxx and I will be working together,” Tyson told the Review-Journal. “He will play me in the film about my life. We already talked about it several times.”
He says his life story is a warning to kids to stay on the straight and narrow. “I’ve seen the devil, and I don’t want that,” Tyson said.
Tyson says he’s alcohol and drug free now, but high school kids say that all the time, and everyone knows what a bunch of damned liars they are. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go fertilize my lawn before I leave for bridge club.
