Sports: some of us cant get enough of them, some of us dont have the first clue why they get everyone else so worked up. Nonetheless, sports and movies have a long and fruitful history together, and theres no real mystery why. Sports draw the viewer in, get them rooting for specific players, make them cheer when their side is winning and recoil when the opponents get the advantage. On some level, most movies look to illicit a similar response. Often when sports show up in a movie, they do play a key role. Obviously you couldnt have a Rocky movie without boxing, Field of Dreams without baseball, and so forth. There are also plenty of instances when a sport makes a fleeting appearance which isnt necessarily vital to the plot, but does serve to advance the narrative and develop the characters: take the tennis scene in Bridesmaids, which further emphasises the rivalry between Kristen Wiig and Rose Byrne, or the American football game in Point Break which serves as Keanu Reeves unofficial initiation into Patrick Swayzes surfer tribe. But then, there are other occasions on which sports are inserted into a movie for no discernible reason except that someone behind the scenes either said hey, I really like , or you know what the kids really like these days? . And so in it goes, regardless of whether or not its integral to the action, whether or not it advances the characters, or whether it even fits the movie in any way, shape or form. At best these scenes provide momentary distraction of a fun and/or sexy kind; at worst they prove woefully unsuccessful attempts to look cool. Here are some of the worst offending movies for needless sidesteps into sport.
