Just as the greatest football games stick in your mind, the same is true of football movies.
Following are my 10 favorite football films. Honorable mentions go to "Friday Night Lights" (2004), "Remember the Titans" (2000) and "The Junction Boys" (2002).
10. Necessary Roughness (1991) — The corrupt Texas State U. Armadillos program is hit so hard by sanctions it has to form a football team made up of actual students. With an aging quarterback (Scott Bakula), a beauty-queen kicker (Kathy Ireland) and your usual gang of misfits, the team vies for respectability. Corny football fun.
9. Everybody's All-American (1988) — Based on Sports Illustrated writer Frank Deford's novel, this sentimental journey tracks the life and career of a star player (Dennis Quaid) and his cheerleader wife (Jessica Lange). It's a love story in shoulder pads.
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8. The Waterboy (1998) — In the first and finest of his two football forays — his remake of "The Longest Yard" stunk like a jockstrap — Adam Sandler plays a timid waterboy with an anger management problem who straps on the shoulder pads. Sandler leads the South Central Louisiana State Mud Dogs to victory, despite the protests of his overprotective mama (Kathy Bates).
7. Horse Feathers (1932) — Leave it to the Marx Brothers to be among the first to make fun of the dead-serious sport. Groucho plays a college president who tries to recruit ringers to step his squad's talent up a notch. The game action is hilarious, not only due to the writing, but because of the weird, old-school uniforms. The film has two funny songs: "Everyone Says I Love You" and "Whatever It Is, I'm Against It."
6. North Dallas Forty (1979) — Nick Nolte spearheads this seriocomedy, loosely based on the 1970s Dallas Cowboys, which lampoons the evils of overpaid, immoral professional athletes and executives. Nolte plays an aging player who wants to undermine the system. It's a chilling precursor to "Any Given Sunday."
5. Brian's Song (1971) — What this old made-for-TV film lacks in production values and smooth editing it makes up for in raw emotion. In this film, based on a true story, James Caan and Billy Dee Williams play guys competing for a starting spot in the Chicago Bears backfield who become friends. One of them gets sick (sob).
4. The Program (1993) — Our man Caan is back, this time as a grisly college football coach willing to bend the rules to get a few extra W's. The movie follows the wild-partying, 'roided-up ways of the student-athletes, as well as two off-field romances, one involving Halle Berry.
3. The Longest Yard (1974) — Considered the ultimate football film by many, this subversive Burt Reynolds comedy taps into the raw nature of teamwork and fighting back against authority. Reynolds plays a star player who's tossed in jail, where he leads a team of prisoners in a game against the guards.
2. Rudy (1993) — Before he was Sam, helping Frodo take the One Ring to oblivion, Sean Astin was Rudy, taking on impossible odds as a runt trying to play for Notre Dame. The true story hits all the right notes of heart-rending underdog sports drama, leading up to the glorious payoff.
1. Any Given Sunday (1999) — Oliver Stone channels all his cinematic energy into a rapid-edited explosion of reverie and cynicism, praising the joys and uncovering the ills of professional football. Al Pacino casts a hard edge as a struggling coach, Dennis Quaid plays an over-the-hill quarterback, Jamie Foxx is stellar as a young hotshot called in to replace him, and James Woods sears as a sleazy team doctor. The drama moves with the speed and panache of Barry Sanders.
