Jonathan! Jonathan!

So many sport films, so many trite storylines and predictable endings. How do people really get paid for rehashing the same thing so many times? (Insert politician joke here) So little in the way of honest critique of contemporary sport. Sure, some films let viewers observe the side-effects of high performance sporting endeavors (e.g. Any Given Sunday), but how many question the values of the entire corporate sport structure itself? How many question, directly, the viewers of violent sporting spectacles in ways that necessitate self-reflection? How many would parents make sure their kids never saw? How many are not used to psych up jacked up high school football players? More importantly, what the hell was going on in the mid 1970s that prompted the release of several films dealing with sporting violence and dystopian visions of sport's role in society? Even more importantly, where have such films gone? (ok...indie film fests aside!)

Death Race 2000 (Bartel, 1975) is perhaps known best for Sylvester Stallone's participation. However, the movie's underlying message that the mass corporate media was complicit in the creation of a violent, even murderous pseudosport event resonates today. Humans are are assigned point values, and drivers rack up points while traversing the US. Some fans even offer up their soon-to-be-corpses for the "honor" of helping the cyborg protagonist ("Frankenstein") add to his total. Empathy replaced by celebrity worship. Sport encompassed by bloodlust.

James Cann's turn as Jonathan E in Rollerball (Jewison, 1975) was visionary in many ways, although the film is rarely praised as such. Visually, what the game scenes lose in slickness, they make up for in cringe-inducing action. The (overly simplistic) notion that the corporate elite managed violent sport to show the futility of individual effort was ahead of its time, for sport films anyway. Jonathan E was allowed to be a star, but when he became bigger than the game...well, he was not supposed to be bigger than the game. No corporate idolatry allowed. The elite were the chess players, and the Rollerball players were their gorefest pawns. The fans cheered his name...and they paid their moolah. The final scene points to radical social change.

Get your hands on Death Race 2000 and Rollerball and watch them as a double feature...and then watch Sportcenter. Watch Cops. Watch 24. Watch Jackass. Watch UFC. Watch American Idol. Watch Monday Night Raw. Watch Bill O'Reilly. Watch the Oscars. Watch some muppet on your local station try to make you feel miserable about the state of the world, frantic about traffic, fearful of the oncoming storm, angry at the latest drug scandal in baseball, and then...finally happy because a local cat saved an 80 year old grandma from her rabid pet monkey. Watch it all...are you cheering for something? Are you properly medicated?

Trailer for Rollerball (1975)