MovieChat Forums > Hoop Dreams (1994) Discussion > Are the critics crazy, or am I??

Are the critics crazy, or am I??

posted 19 years ago by haverpopper4
105 replies | jump to latest

**Warning, some spoilers below**

So I finally saw "Hoop Dreams" last night, and while I thought it was good, and sometimes even very good (I think I'd give it a respectable 7/10 on Imdb) I'm frankly astonished that this is the movie that Roger Ebert listed as the Best Movie of the 90s, and that was on more critics top 10 lists in 1994 than any other movie. I think my main problem was that I was unable to empathize with the characters quite as much as the filmmakers intended me to (or as much as many critics evidently did). But how could I, considering how maddeningly stupid the boys and their families could be throughout the film?? Now, I don't want to overstate things, and I realize that there was a lot of hardship and misery that the families could not avoid, but there were equal amounts of stupidity on display. Members of both boy's families repeatedly lost minimum wage jobs; no explanations were given for the majority of these losses, but it seems likely that given, for example, Arthur's father's crack problem and William's brother's attitude problem, they weren't good workers who were simply let go because of tough economic times. But this is glossed over, and instead we're treated to a minor rant from Arthur's mother about how the people in charge of welfare just "don't care." Now, I know it's not her fault that her husband was a crackhead moron, but I also can't help but be a bit skeptical that she couldn't keep a job because of "chronic back pain," considering the way she was able to move when Arthur scored in a basketball game.

And how about William's brother? Am I really supposed to sympathize with him? The guy had a promising basketball career and a college scholarship, but his attitude was so bad that he lost out on both, becomes a security guard, and then even loses that job, for unexplained (but surmisable) reasons, and sits at home without a job for months on end. Reading through some reviews, I get the impression that I'm supposed to view this guy as a tragic victim of the ghettoes, but as far as I can see (given the information we have from the movie) he has no one to blame but himself.

And as for the two leads, William and Arthur. Naturally you want to sympathize with the guys, but sometimes they just make it hard, especially Arthur. Was I the only one watching the movie who wanted to slap the guy upside the head, make him sit up straight, look his teachers in the eye, and pay attention in class? He seemed to have some good teachers (both at the Catholic school and the inner city school, the latter of which, incidentally, didn't seem to be the unsurmountable urban jungle of popular imagination) but the kid was so stupid and disruptive he barely graduated. If his education was as important as his mother claimed, why didn't she do what any responsible parent would do and threaten to take him off the basketball team if he didn't knuckle down in his studies?? William fares much better in this regard, and there's some indication that he has some degree of untapped academic potential. But really, how dumb do you have to be to take the ACT 5 times, including free special tutorial training sessions, and still only average a 17.5, which then has to be rounded up to an 18, the **bare minimum** needed to get a sports scholarship?? And then there are the maddening personal choices made by the boys, both fathering illegitamate children before the movie is over -- guess that Catholic education did William a lot of good. Anyways, being dumb and inarticulate (which both boys also are) does not make one a bad person, but it does make one a less interesting documentary subject.

I realize I've been harsh, but I'm not totally unsympathetic to the boys and their families. The way they were manipulated by the system was also maddening, and no one came out in a very good light. (Though, for all the reviewers who demonize the "system" on display in the movie, it also had its good side, such as Marquette honoring its commitment to let William keep his scholarship even after dropping out of the basketball team.) And I'm sure the life in inner city Chicago was not easy -- some of Arthur's idiocy can be excused by the actions of his father. (The scene where he sees his coked up dad on the basketball court was the most astonishing scene in the film for me.) But at the end of the day, in too many ways the boys and their families held themselves back too much for me to rank this as the masterpiece so many others found it to be.

[–] fileboy2002 18 years ago

I think you are missing the point here. Sure, the kids in this film make bad choices. However, middle and upper-middle class kids make bad choices all the time--i.e. they use drugs, blow off jobs, get bad grades, and so on.

The difference is that when middle and upper-middle class kids screw up, they get a second chance. Then a third. Then a forth, and so on. Their greater resources--economic and social--help protect them from the consequences of their own actions.

The real difference between this kids and millions of better-off kids is not their behavior. The difference is they lack the resources to recover from their bad choices.

[–] phillystunna 18 years ago

This isn't Hoosiers...this is real life.

Mozart is “The clever nerd..the best m.c. with no chain ya ever heard.”

[–] jjarvis-4 18 years ago

This whole thread is depressing to me. Sure, about five people acknowledge the structural disadvantages that marginalized communities (in the case of Hoop Dreams, "poor" and black) face which makes ye' olde "American Dream" (work hard and you're golden: Set for life; middle classin' it up; or "better", rolling in dough) virtually impossible! But most of these posts represent a society void of empathy or education, and rife with fear, misconceptions, and racism that hides behind the "I'm not racist but..." logic.
Everyone is trying to make it; get their piece of the pie; maintain their access to resources; etc. In the process, people in our society who desperately need help are demonized as drains on society while they struggle to SURVIVE (not to figure out when they're going to take their next vacation or any such luxury--I'm talking about getting food on the table for their families, taking kids and selves to the doctor when they're ill, navigating public transit to get to a far away job/school on time, FINDING even a minimum wage job). These people's blocked access to, say, health care is not due to some genetic inferiority, or inherent laziness, but STRUCTURAL realities.
Why on Earth would the mother's of these amazing two boys take punitive action toward their suffering GPA's and take away their basketball privileges when their athletic prowess is the only visible means to emergence from poverty? Reality check: Inner city schools suck: They are underfunded, overpopulated, have fewer credentialed teachers, fewer computers per student, outdated buildings and resources (textbooks, technology, etc.), more portable buildings, fewer counselors, fewer department and class offerings, more resultant crime and it's partner: The daily fear of being violated. Education is the best predictor for poverty and wealth. How are low-income communities and individuals supposed to fight an uphill battle against a dominant class with a propensity toward individualist thinking (i.e., a belief in a just world wherein everyone has equal access to achievement; meritocracy: You get what you earn whether it's poverty or wealth or anywhere in between; a belief in the "American Dream; etc.) and who has the access to education necessary to make it happen?
These boys and their families had a carrot hanging in their faces since the boys were in junior high. Scouts looking to make a buck slithered their ways into their lives (by the way, this is common practice in the "ghettoes" where many a brilliantly skilled athlete has been reared and exploited by business persons who care little about their subjects other than the profit they may generate) and because a PhD is hardly a likely outcome because of substandard educational opportunities, basketball IS that pie in the sky chance for upward mobility. What these boys and their families were not told is how slim the chances actually were for them to land careers in the NBA and in the meantime, while they were fostering their their marketable skill, education was passing them by. They had full time jobs by 8th grade: Basketball. By the time their "big breaks" at their respective colleges arose, I argue they-- through no fault of their own (quite the opposite of what many of the above posters believe)-- were academically stunted. But check this out: That does NOT mean they aren't strikingly intelligent. Just because they don't possess the mainstream markers of intelligence (i.e., high GPA's), they clearly had survival, athletic, emotional, familial/relationship, and many other intelligences. I'm deeply saddened to read that they are "stupid", "dumb", "losers", "to blame", "idiots," etc. Deeply. I hang on to hope that attitudes like these can change. I encourage anyone to educate themselves on issues of race/ethnicity, poverty, and any other issues of social injustice so that we may all learn more about what it means to have empathy and put ourselves in others' shoes as a means to hate/fear reduction and mobilization of people out of poverty. I'm asking with my heart for readers of this post to read my words with the knowledge that I am not persecuting anyone for their beliefs, I just believe particular beliefs expressed above are dangerous and detrimental to an inclusive society that can positively impact ALL of us. Thank you. P.S. I love Hoop Dreams.

[–] phillystunna 18 years ago

Hey,

That was an amazing post. Everything you wrote is what I believe. I grew up in the projects and got lucky when my mother became an RN, we got out of there. But what you wrote was powerful because it's so very true and yet so very sad.

Thank you.

Mozart is “The clever nerd..the best m.c. with no chain ya ever heard.”

[–] Ezra_Pound 18 years ago

Yes, good post. Very true.

And then went down to the ship,
Set keel to breakers, forth on the godly sea

[–] carthur27 10 years ago

"The difference is that when middle and upper-middle class kids screw up, they get a second chance. Then a third. Then a forth, and so on. Their greater resources--economic and social--help protect them from the consequences of their own actions."

Truly ridiculous. Such writing is the product of a very prejudiced mind.

[–] Hamsterman11 8 years ago

You need to explain why it's wrong. because it seems a valid statement to me. Otherwise your 'ridiculous' statement is nothingbut hyperbole.

[–] stoscarthegreat 18 years ago

I don't want to read all of these posts, so if this has already been said just ignore me. The reason this movie is so great is that it is a REAL look at things that many people (including myself) never see. You actually saw the real inner city Chicago, the world of prep school athletics, you actually see the letters Gates gets from colleges after his sophomore year, and how they affect him, and of course you see how basketball can dominate their lives and how it changes over the years. It's all real, not set-up and not overly dramatized.

The reasons the first poster didn't like it are kind of irrelevant. Absolutely it's hard to root for Gates' older brother. And it is absolutely amazing how clueless and foolish the boys could be. Highlighted first by Gates having a child as a HS junior then by Arthur discussing his ambitions at the juco. I believe he mentioned communications to one person, accounting to another, running a business, and I believe he also stated architecture to the filmmakers.

Making you feel good isn't the point of the movie, it's about telling the story of its subjects.

Probably best of all is that the film doesn't make your opinion, but lets you form your own conclusions about the system, about the people and about various topics surrounding the story. That's what a great documentary does and why this is a 10.

[–] tranquil17 18 years ago

Your post is understandable, unsurprising, and honest. I suspect that lots of people have the reaction that you had to the film.

In my opinion, you are not necessarily supposed to sympathize without hesitation with the people in the film. Some of them, such as Arthur's dad, seem much less sympathetic than others; we look at a guy like this and wonder why he can't quit the drugs. Then, should we sympathize more with Arthur Jr. and the mother and their family because the father in the family is strung out on crack all of the time? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe we should just look at them and say "that's life -- figure it out." Should we not sympathize with Curtis because he had a poor attitude about how his life has gone? In some ways, maybe yes, in some ways not. We could go on and on with this, looking at different characters and thinking about if we should feel sorry for them or whatever. For one though, I suspect that none of these people want your sympathy. Then again, this isn't what you're supposed to get out of the film anyway.

You are an observer of a filmed world that is a million miles from your own. You are meant to watch and see how their lives are, not to judge their choices and think about how they should have done this or that. Maybe they even have tried some of the things that you think they should have done and these things haven't worked. Maybe they havnen't tried any constructive attempts at fixing their problems, but you should still see this as a product of their situation and of who they are, not as some product of being stupid. It is totally inappropriate for you to judge the decision-making skills of the people in the film because you can't possibly know what their lives are like. You don't know what kind of an education they're getting. You don't know the daily effects of being in a low income situation, of living without lights in your house, of living amidst drugs and guns and everything else that one might encounter in these kinds of rough neighborhoods.

You should look up the word "insidious" in the dictionary. The problems that are faced by the people in the film are insidious, not cause and effect. Arthur's dad doesn't take drugs because he's a bad guy or an idiot or a loser, it's for reasons that have been building up for his entire life, and then now that he's on drugs, he just uses because he's an addict and it's extremely difficult for an addict to quit or for a person to face difficult obstacles. Such is the nature of all of the problems of all of the people in the film, and I would suspect that whatever problems that you have, while not insignificant, are somewhat easier to deal with in a situation in which you have money and family support to catch you before you fall to far.

Through the 5 years that is spent with these people, we get a better idea than most films give us of how these kinds of insidious problems develop, and yet we still can have difficulty understanding many of the decisions of the people in the film. But I think you ought to look at the film again with a different eye and try to realize that you can't really compare your life to theirs. There are millions of people around the U.S. and around the world living with a level of hardship and poverty that knocks them down so frequently that to wonder why they can't just make better decisions would be like wondering why a row of dominoes can't stop itself from continuing to fall.

[–] tramlaw301 18 years ago

This is My Number 1 sports movie of all time.
The critics are actually right about this one.

[–] pandagoalie34 17 years ago

I hate to be rude to phillystunna but dude, Hoosier is based on real life events. It was reality.

[–] Theone442 17 years ago

Panda its really easy of you to judge inner city youths on their descision making while you look back from you life of comfort never having to worry about food or electricity or fear for your life on a constant basis.

First of all these kids are exploited. Rich people come into their neighborhoods fill these kids with false hopes and dreams at 10 or 11 years old that encourage them to practice their basketball skills all day. But once these rich people sees these kids arent quite good enough they imediately are ignored and dropped back into the system with a lack any real world skills.

Its easy for you to criticize their education and lack of studying when you look back from your suburban school system stocked full of maps and books and computers and capable teachers. You look in their schools and you see maybe 4 textbooks printed from the 1960s for a class of 40 kids, apathetic underqualified teachers kids running around with guns and knives and drugs in school. Why dont you try to concentrate and study and learn when you dont know where your next meal will come, when at any given moment death is a real possibility.

You sit there smirking about how these kids cant read and are stupid. But you growing up always had loving parents and willing teachers pushing you and checking your homework. Imagine how well you would have faired if your parents and teachers were drug addicts, would you really have studied by yourself in those situations?

You ask why didnt their mothers threaten to take them off the basketball team to improve their academics? Imagine if you were their mother, you take them off the team, where would they go after school then when your working 18 hours a day with gangs running all around?

You criticize William for not taking advantage of the school he was in and focus on academic, but did you take a second to think what it was like in his mind? He entered a school grades behind his peers, but with a singular basketball talent. Would you in that situation have not tried to focus much more on your strengths? Would you have really been brave enough at 16 to risk the only skill that you believe has been able to give you hope of escaping from the ghetto and ignore it to catch up on years of study?

The only escape these kids have is basketball, not as a gateway, but when they are on the court they can at least for a few moments escape from the dire situation they are in. To even survive to adulthood is a miracle for these kids.

[–] katalist420 17 years ago

This is an awesome movie and was a tie for my movie of the year that year with Pul Fiction, both fantastic movies in ther eown right.

If you have an open mind, Hoop Dreams is a gem without a doubt, a wonderful peice of film.

[–] AbuSamra 17 years ago

This movie is just a great documentary. If you don't feel sympathy for the KIDS in the movie, that is fine, it is still a good portrait of two kids' lives and their struggle to grow into men. One of the most telling and dramatic moments is when they show Arthur watching his dad buying drugs at a basketball court, good stuff. Watching William get funding while Arthur was kicked out of school because of differing levels of basketball talent was a sad moment, even though I was only 11 when I saw it. It was also great seeing a young Shaq, Webber, and Howard at basketball camp, makes you realize how much pressure these guys have been under ever since they were 10 years old and 6' 3".

[–] gullyjuice 16 years ago

You have to ask yourself why they are the way they are. Is it their surroundings that got them there? Is it something they were born with? Why does everyone seem the way they are? Can they be helped? You can see them as stupid and lazy, but you have to ask yourself why they are like that.

I see what you did there

[–] Dudley_Dawson 16 years ago

You bring up some good points. I enjoyed the documentary very much but I did turn off the little skeptical guy on my shoulder. I don't mind being a director's concubine for a few hours. Usually the film is better if you do that.

But yes, afterwards I started asking the same questions. The cronic back pain made me do a double take and I think the black coach nailed the 1,300 dollar outstanding tuition issue. If there was only 1,300 outstanding and Agee was really that good, they would have worked something out. He was kicked out because he wasn't that good. He didn't deliver on his promise after the school delivered on theirs, although Agee's promise to play well wasn't really binding.

I also noticed that William sat all slouched in a chair and wasn't the respectful type. I kept wanting to smack him too. How do you sit in a guidence councelor's office in that manner?

[–] snu_grad 16 years ago

I think you are being a little harsh. Yes, some of the situations they found themselves in were self-inflicted. I had no sympathy for Curtis. He blew it, plain and simple. At least his experience gave William a first-hand account of the problems he could encounter if he wasn't completely dedicated and willing to do whatever it took.

If his education was as important as his mother claimed, why didn't she do what any responsible parent would do and threaten to take him off the basketball team if he didn't knuckle down in his studies??

She thought that was the only way he would get an education beyond high school. While making him quit the team may have been 'the right thing to do', in her mind, why would she take away what she believed was his only opportunity?

Yes, the kids were frustrating at times, as well as the parents. But that's what real people do: they let you down. They don't live up to our expectations. I think the film gave people a chance to view a world they would never see, and there's nothing wrong with that.

[–] 16 years ago

[deleted]