402 - Hoop Dreams, United States, 1994. Dir. Steve James.

Tuesday, February 6, 2018

402 - Hoop Dreams, United States, 1994.  Dir. Steve James.

Arthur Agee lives on the Southside in Chicago.

William Gates lives in project called Cabrini-Green.

They both play basketball.

They both play basketball on playgrounds.

They are in Junior High School.

Earl Smith is a scout for St. Joseph High School in Westchester, Illinois.

A scout for a high school.

Scouting playgrounds.

The roots of professional sports run deeply.

Earl Smith stands against the fence at the playground, watching Arthur Agee play.  He says Agee has the quickest first step of anyone he has seen in the past five years.

He is hoping to find the next Isiah Thomas.

That is Isiah without the initial a.  He played point guard for the Detroit Pistons.  A two-time NBA Champion.  A twelve-time NBA All-Star.  A sports commentator.  Drafted second overall from the Indiana Hoosiers.  Which means he played for Bobby Knight.  And won the 1981 NCAA Tournament.

Do not confuse him with Isaiah Thomas with the initial a.  He has played for the Kings, the Suns, and the Celtics, and currently plays for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Earl Smith wants to find the next Isiah Thomas because Isiah grew up in a neighborhood just like this one.  And played basketball on a playground.  And was recruited to St. Joseph High School in Westchester.  And took the 90-minute train.

Smith makes Agee an offer.

Agee accepts.

Now Arthur Agee at age 14 takes the 90-minute train to St. Joseph.  To play basketball.  To be the next Isiah Thomas.

Smith makes Gates a similar offer.  And Gates also accepts.

Both boys are following their dreams.  Their Hoop Dreams.  High School Freshmen dreaming of the NBA.

Arthur Agee makes the Freshman team.  William Gates makes the Varsity team.  Just like Isiah did.

Agee is shy.  And much is made of his shyness.

Coach Gene Pingatore, at least as shown in the movie, is not patient.  He wants Agee to grow.  He wants him to grow now.  When Agee does not grow fast enough, Pingatore cuts him.

Now the school wants its tuition money.

And they hold Agee's transcripts hostage until his parents pay it.

Agee has transferred back home to the public school Marshall, where he would have gone anyway had he not been recruited, but he will not graduate on time if he does not get his transcripts.

Wait a second.

Here was a kid who was minding his own business, playing basketball at the playground in his own back yard, and you came and recruited him to a private school, made promises of greatness to him, and offered him a scholarship (which his mother claims she understood to be a full ride), and now you decide to cut him from the team and send him a bill?  And hold his transcripts hostage until his family pays it?

Something is rotten in the state of Westchester.

Coach Gene Pingatore, at least as shown in the movie, is also not very discerning.  Arthur Agee will grow at Marshall and eventually flourish.  And yes, he will lead his team of giant slayers deep into the high school playoffs as Coach Pingatore's team loses early and Coach sits watching Agee play as he himself sits in the stands.

We are not necessarily rooting against Pingatore.  We are just sharing in the Agees' frustration.  Why did you do that?  If you recruit a child, why not believe in the child?  Why not have the courage of your own convictions and see it through to the end?  Is that not what you claim to be teaching the young men you coach?  To finish?  Why would you yourself not finish?

We do understand that we are being manipulated by the medium of the documentary.  So the facts in real life might not be precisely the same as they are portrayed.  But we are responding to the information we are given.  And to the way it is portrayed.  That is all we have.  The characters are one step removed from real life, even though it is a documentary.

William Gates stays at St. Joseph.  At first he is a stand-out, but then he is injured.  And we watch as he works through the injury to get back on the court.  The local commentators cite him publicly as the next big star, and he makes it to the prestigious Nike Camp, where he gets to work with Dick Vitale and Bobby Knight, among others.  Spike Lee also shows up at the camp, but he speaks cynically to the boys, undermining the positive energy that the others are trying to instill.  It is not clear why he is even there.  After listening to him speak, one imagines that he may have talked some of the kids into quitting altogether.

The film follows many people in the lives of these two boys.

Arthur's mother Sheila.  His father Bo.  His sister Tomika.  His brother Joe.

William's mother Emma.  His brother Curtis.  Himself a former high school star for whom things did not work out.  His father Willie.

Arthur's coach at Marshall, Luther Bedford.

One of the heroes is Patricia Weir, the president of Encyclopedia Britannica, who helps them along the way.

We watch as the playground becomes a place for drug deals, and as Arthur's own father Bo makes a transaction in front of him while Arthur is playing ball.

Bo, who had been faithful for twenty years, who himself had been a ballplayer, who had believed in his son and nicknamed him Man, gets hooked on crack cocaine, leaves the family, and spends time in jail.  Then he comes back, takes the family to church, and sings his testimony of how God delivered him.  You can see the fatigue in Arthur's eyes.  He seems past the point of hoping this transformation is real.  Later Bo will leave again and return again, just in time to lecture Arthur in front of a college recruiter pressuring Arthur to sign a contract.

William is in a similar situation.  In his case his father has always been gone.  His father sells used cars and invites William to come to the lot so he can give him one when he is old enough.  William wonders if his father is getting involved in his life now that he is showing promise as a basketball player.

One wonders if this is the bottom line.  Where are the fathers?  The film shows the mothers working their tails off to keep their families together and provide a better life for their children.

Some reviewers have talked about race, economics, the "system," and other abstract concepts as being "at fault" for the protagonist's struggles, but in the context of the film itself race has little to do with anything.  Economics does but mostly as a direct consequence of not having a father in the home providing for the family.  And "the system," if anything is giving the kids extraordinary opportunities in the first place.  Opportunities that all the other kids in the movie--the siblings, the neighbors, the classmates, the cheerleaders, the band members, and the fans--do not even have.

Yesterday we watched Boyhood (2014), a film that followed four people plus others over twelve years to tell a fictional story.

Today we are watching Hoop Dreams (1994), a film that follows two people plus others over five years to tell a true story.

Both are extraordinary achievements.

And of course when they began the project, the filmmakers did not know how it would turn out.

The viewer leaves caring about the people.  Arthur and William and their families, their coaches, and the recruiters.  Everyone is trying.  Trying to make it.

Trying to follow their own dreams.

And in some cases, trying to decide what they are.