"Let's Not Talk About Movies": Don't Make a Scene: Hoosiers

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Don't Make a Scene: Hoosiers

The Set-up: Everybody needs a pep-talk now and then.

Below, you'll find a video montage of great rip-snorting speeches from movies past. They're fun for getting an audience's blood up, and it always looks good on a star's Oscar reel to perform in front of a crowd of extras. Not every actor's day is St. Crispin's Day.

But this one is my favorite. "We're way past 'Big Speech' Time" says the coach. There's nothing left to say. The strategies are there, to be tweaked on the court. To a man, everyone in that room wants it to be two hours later so they know how it all turned out. But, now, at this moment in time, they're unsure. They know they CAN win, but they don't know if they WILL. So many factors. So many unknowns. So, now, is the time for some basic truths. The players give their own inspirational wishes for victory, all unselfish, duly noted by the coach. The preachers pick particularly apt things to say, involving both humility, and potential. But, at the last, is the most important.

Alan Alda, in the commencement speech he gave at his daughter's college graduation, said that, however a time was had at a gathering, it is always the most important thing that is left unsaid until the last thing...right at the door...before you turn away and separate and move on with your lives. Whatever has passed, those crucial moments are filled with something beyond pleasantries, the day-to-day, reveries, and "catching up." "The Thing Left Unsaid" in case...well, what if you never see each other again? What if lives have become so drastically altered in the mean that those unsaid words lose their importance? Those Important Things need to be said in the times of ordinariness...not just special occassions. And so, rather than lose the opportunity we say it...at the last possible moment.

The most important things are said at the door.

So...these words. They will end this scene, and they will, ultimately, end the movie.

I love this scene. I love this movie.

The Story: The Hickory Huskers, a small high school basketball team from Indiana, has, improbably, made it into the state final, despite set-backs, internal conflicts and a controversial coach (Gene Hackman). Now, just before "The Big Game," it's time to go over the essentials.

Team!