- Hoosiers (David Anspaugh, 1986)
- White Men Can’t Jump (Ron Shelton, 1992)
- Blue Chips (William Friedkin, 1994)
- He Got Game (Spike Lee, 1998)
- Coach Carter (Thomas Carter, 2005)
In chronological order.
Jason Reitman’s Up in the Air (2009) is a quietly devastating, sharply intelligent film that blends timely social commentary with an intimate portrait of loneliness and disconnection in the modern world. Adapted loosely from Walter Kirn’s 2001 novel of the same name, the film takes the broad premise of the book (a corporate downsizer addicted to life in airports and hotels) and refines it into a more focused and emotionally resonant exploration of what it means to be untethered in a world that values efficiency over connection. George Clooney delivers one of the most nuanced performances of his career as
- Body and Soul (Robert Rossen, 1947)
- The Set-Up (Robert Wise, 1949)
- Champion (Mark Robson, 1949)
- The Harder They Fall (Mark Robson, 1956)
- Fat City (John Huston, 1972)
- Rocky (John G. Avildsen, 1976)
In chronological order.
Few literary friendships have been as influential as that between J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. Both were Oxford scholars. Both were devoted Christians. Both loved mythology, fairy tales, and medieval literature. Both helped shape modern fantasy. Yet when one compares their major works, The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia, the differences are so striking that it is difficult to believe they emerged from the same intellectual circle. The contrast begins with the most obvious question: how does Christian belief appear in the fiction? For Lewis, the answer is straightforward. Christianity appears directly, almost openly. Narnia is
- The Longest Yard (Robert Aldrich, 1974)
- Everybody’s All American (Taylor Hackford, 1988)
- Any Given Sunday (Oliver Stone, 1999)
- Remember the Titans (Boaz Yakin, 2000)
- Friday Night Lights (Peter Berg, 2004)
In chronological order.
David Hare’s Worricker Trilogy, consisting of Page Eight (2011), Turks & Caicos (2014), and Salting the Battlefield (2014), occupies a curious place in modern British espionage fiction. Produced for television by the BBC but filmed and performed with the sophistication of high-end cinema, the trilogy feels like a deliberate attempt to create a contemporary counterpart to the moral and political spy stories associated with John le Carré. It succeeds not by imitating George Smiley, but by asking what a Smiley-like figure would look like in the twenty-first century. The answer is Johnny Worricker, played magnificently by Bill Nighy. The trilogy
- The Natural (Barry Levinson, 1984)
- Bull Durham (Ron Shelton, 1988)
- Eight Men Out (John Sayles, 1988)
- Field of Dreams (Phil Alden Robinson, 1989)
- For Love of the Game (Sam Raimi, 1999)
- Moneyball (Bennett Miller, 2011)
In chronological order.
Divinity: Original Sin (2014), the fourth main entry in the Divinity game series, sits in an interesting place in modern RPG history. It arrived at a time when the genre was leaning heavily toward cinematic presentation and streamlined mechanics, and instead pushed in almost the opposite direction: systemic depth, player freedom, and a willingness to be awkward if it meant being flexible. I did finish the game at the time of its launching, both with a party of four and with two lone wolves. This time I cheated a bit: I installed a mod that allows for a party of
- Tintin (Hergé)
- Spider Jerusalem (Warren Ellis & Darick Robertson)
- Ben Urich (Roger McKenzie & Gene Colan)
- Brenda Starr (Dale Messick)
Ted Lewis’s Jack’s Return Home (1970) occupies an interesting position in crime fiction history. It is not as famous as the film it inspired, yet it is arguably one of the foundational texts of modern British noir. Before Lewis, British crime fiction often retained traces of the gentleman detective, the police procedural, or the thriller. Lewis dragged the genre into something nastier, more provincial, and more psychologically damaged. His England is not the picturesque England of village mysteries but a decaying industrial landscape full of petty criminals, corruption, class resentment, and moral rot. It begins with the blunt, almost absurd