Hoop Dreams (1994)

This film isn't really about "Hoop Dreams." It's about two teenagers growing up in urban Chicago facing a plethora of life challenges, one of which happens to be basketball. As we follow Agee and Gates through their high school years, we see them mature mentally and psychologically as they struggle through difficulties, from a father who can't seem to act like an adult to trying to get a high enough ACT score to obtain a scholarship. The most striking thing about the film is that for tens of minutes at a time, you forget that you're watching a documentary, and it feels like not much more than another urban-kid-overcomes-life's-challenges film. That's not a good thing. The filmmakers have failed to continually remind the viewer that this is not a fictional film, resulting, at times, in an all-too-familiar plot structure. The film's moments of brilliance, though, come when the viewer is abruptly reminded that this film isn't fake at all. A scene toward the end of the film features an 18-year-old Agee playing a game of street basketball with his father, who for much of the film refuses to act his age. Sure enough, when Agee easily handles his aged, trash-talking father, his father dons an unsportsmanlike attitude fit for an eighth grader. No writer could ever write a scene like that, no director could ever create the realism of the scene, and most notably, no actor could ever imitate the immaturity shown by this middle-aged man It's a quality documentary, but the story it has to tell is, in many regards, unremarkable considering the many fictional films out there that tell a nearly identical story to this one.