RARA-AVIS: Re: Noir sports...

From: Charlie Williams ( cs_will@hotmail.com)
Date: 21 Feb 2008


So where are all the (team) sports noirs? Rugby (as all sport) is rampantly commercial now but it's not going to work if the players on the pitch don't buy into the team thing. Unlike football, where you can quite successfully indulge a maverick in the team.

I agree that there is fertile ground for fiction there (especially about the African kids). But noir? Hardboiled?

And these examples of sports gambling are irrelevant. Fake ID, Bad Lieutenant etc are about gambling and status, not sports. Tommy Russo is not a jockey nor a trainer. His involvement in sports is tangential. Getting back to the original post, This Sporting Life is actually about the sport. At least a bit.

I've read Fever Pitch and I don't find that it helps here.

Charlie
----------

charliewilliams.net

--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, Steve Novak <Cinefrog@...> wrote:
>
> Yet, some people would say that organized sports are part of the
overall
> alienation...etc...etc...and within the rugby world, the shift of
Rugby
> Union from amateur sport to professionalism (early 90¹s in France,
UK...etc)
> is proof of the alienation endured at large through rampant
> commercialisation, etc, etc....It is evident to me that these could
be the
> foundations for characters and stories within that sport¹s world...
> In that very vein the debates presently running arount soccer team
> ownerships, player transfers, import of African youngsters, matches
abroad
> for Premiership teams... all contribute to this sense of alienation
by fans
> and/or players and could be the subtext for plots,
characters...because the
> baddies are numerous and powerful...
> I suggest a good reading of Nick Hornsby¹s Fever Pitch followed by
How
> Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization by
Franklin
> Foer....to get into the mood...and this could be applied to any
organized
> sport...
>
> Remember in Bad Lieutenant the link between character, gambling and
baseball
> World Series...and I bet we can all find many other examples...
>
> Montois
>
> On 2/21/08 3:59 AM, "Charlie Williams" <cs_will@...> wrote:
>
> >
> > Which brings us back to rugby (or whatever wholesome team sport
you
> > care to pick), which represents the antithesis of alienation,
which
> > is maybe why there is a dearth of noir and hardboiled stories in
that
> > area. Of course, all you have to do is get one of the team
alienated
> > and you have a story. But I still think there are other factors at
> > play that stop rugby going all noir.
> >
> > Charlie.
> >
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>



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