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Wrestling Movie


stickittoem

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Unfortunately, wrestling movies will always have a hard time pulling in the box office numbers to get a studio to put a lot of effort in to making one mostly based on the sport aspect of things.

 

 

A while back someone took my idea for a wrestling movie when they made "The Rookie."  For those of you who forgot or did nto watch it this is the one somewhat based on a true story where a school teacher/coach was given a second chance to make the baseball big leagues.  I had a similar idea back in high school for a wrestling movie.  A former wrestler who had to give it up early in his college career due to major injury.  But after working with a local high school team later in life he was talked into participating in some freestlyle tournaments by them.  After doing well they kids enter him in to the Olympic Trials (for the sake of the audiance understanding we skipped the nationals qualfier)  to see if he has what it takes.  He trains hard to not be embarassed and goes to it just for fun to see if he can win a few.  But ends up doing well.  Runs into some of his former college competition he had battled with (now World Medalists) in the finals round to see if he would make the US Olympic team.   But after "The Rookie" was made I'm guessing that idea would be looked over by the studios since its been done and wrestling isn't the draw like baseball is.

 

I would love to see more wrestling related movies hit the mainstream.  But you need a quality script, some decent star power, and a big studio push to get people interested in a sports based movie about something they know little about.

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Some of the trailers out there for movies that are currently out or are coming out - all of which look like they could be good...Enjoy :)

 

Beyond the Mat Trailer: Beyond the Mat - MOVIE TRAILER

 

Perfect Sport Trailer: "Perfect Sport" Trailer

 

The Perfect Circle Trailer:

 

Takedowns and Falls Trailer:

 

Pinned Trailer:

 

Article about Win Win: http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/2010/02/tom-mccarthy-tackles-wrestling-in-win.html

 

Independence: Wrestling With a Community Trailer: Independence: Wrestling With A Community

 

Veritas Trailer: http://www.veritas-movie.com/

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The movie with John Cena and Danny Glover is called Legendary.  This movie is pretty good and the story line is believable.  Youngest son goes out for wrestling and gets help from the older brother, John Cena, who is out of town and was a state champion.  Movie ends at the county tournbament.  Danny Glover plays an older gentleman who convences the teenage to go out for the wrestling team.  Got to watch the movie for more info, don't want to give anything away.

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The movie with John Cena and Danny Glover is called Legendary.  This movie is pretty good and the story line is believable.  Youngest son goes out for wrestling and gets help from the older brother, John Cena, who is out of town and was a state champion.  Movie ends at the county tournbament.  Danny Glover plays an older gentleman who convences the teenage to go out for the wrestling team.  Got to watch the movie for more info, don't want to give anything away.

 

My wrestler son and I watched this movie - it was OK.  I think my son enjoyed Cena's fight scenes more than the wrestling scenes in the movie...but the plot was believable and sad in some aspects.

 

On a side note, a remake of Vision Quest was mentioned earlier and I read an article that said that Taylor Lautner from Twilight fame signed on to play Louden Swain in the remake...this primarily came about because he plays a Pennsylvania wrestler in his new movie "Abduction" (according to the article, his mat rival in the movie is an actual Pennsylvania wrestler from Hampton High, Jake Hart.) There is a Facebook page entitled "Wrestlers Against Taylor Lautner" that currently has 1,397 members...so I'm guessing not everyone is hyped about his possible portrayal of Louden... ;)

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Thanks for the list MatChick.  I've seen the trailer for a few of those before but others are new to me.  

 

I was really hopeing that the Big 10 Network would take a chance at a wrestling team for their series "The Journey."  They have improved their wrestling programing on the network.  However, there is a limit to the amount of none wrestlers who will sit and watch those matches since they have little understand of the sport or connection to individual athletes.  However, a show dedicated to the behind the scenes aspect of wrestling training and athletes as they prograss through the season could draw a wider audiance of people.  I can see the average viewer being intreged by the training, interested in the uniqueness, and drawn in by the pre-match drama that goes into a wrestling season.  Big 10 network viewers are going to watch basketball and football in big numbers on the network anyway.  Why not develop a show around a lesser sport (same with a show on girls volleyball in the fall and baseball in the spring) to try to increase viewership of that sports programs.  Just imagine watching the development of a team like Penn State, Iowa, Minnisota, ....and see them progresses through the season as they try to get a Big 10 and NCAA title.  Seems like that would be as intersting as the basketball or football team practices they usually highlight.   Wish someone at the Big 10 network had enough wrestling pull to give it a chance.

 

Also, with how popular ESPNs 30/30 documentary video series was this year I would think they would want to develop a yearly show based around sports documentaries.  If this occured a few of these and previous wrestling documentaries may be great selections for one of the episodes.

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Thanks for the list MatChick.  I've seen the trailer for a few of those before but others are new to me.  

 

I was really hopeing that the Big 10 Network would take a chance at a wrestling team for their series "The Journey."  They have improved their wrestling programing on the network.  However, there is a limit to the amount of none wrestlers who will sit and watch those matches since they have little understand of the sport or connection to individual athletes.  However, a show dedicated to the behind the scenes aspect of wrestling training and athletes as they prograss through the season could draw a wider audiance of people.  I can see the average viewer being intreged by the training, interested in the uniqueness, and drawn in by the pre-match drama that goes into a wrestling season.  Big 10 network viewers are going to watch basketball and football in big numbers on the network anyway.  Why not develop a show around a lesser sport (same with a show on girls volleyball in the fall and baseball in the spring) to try to increase viewership of that sports programs.  Just imagine watching the development of a team like Penn State, Iowa, Minnisota, ....and see them progresses through the season as they try to get a Big 10 and NCAA title.  Seems like that would be as intersting as the basketball or football team practices they usually highlight.   Wish someone at the Big 10 network had enough wrestling pull to give it a chance.

 

Also, with how popular ESPNs 30/30 documentary video series was this year I would think they would want to develop a yearly show based around sports documentaries.  If this occured a few of these and previous wrestling documentaries may be great selections for one of the episodes.

 

Would love to see a 30 for 30 documentary on Gable and the rise of Iowa wrestling, much like they did with Miami football.  That would be awesome.

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Would love to see a 30 for 30 documentary on Gable and the rise of Iowa wrestling, much like they did with Miami football.  That would be awesome.

 

Not sure anything can or would compared to "The U" documentary about Miami football.  It was a unique look at a unique group.  But you would think ESPN would use the sucess of those programs to continue seeking out and showing quality sports documentaries.  They already have one on Iowa  "The Season" and one on Brandon, FL when they ended their win streak.  So it wouldn't to be hard to show them as part of a new season of Documentary shows and then seek out more if the popularity is there.  I just hope ESPN can see the benifit of continueing such a program instead of it being a one time thing.

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Also, with how popular ESPNs 30/30 documentary video series was this year I would think they would want to develop a yearly show based around sports documentaries.  If this occured a few of these and previous wrestling documentaries may be great selections for one of the episodes.

 

 

ESPN has the documentary series "The Season"...I read somewhere that they did one entitiled "The Season: Iowa Hawkeye Wrestling"...would love to see it...I found some clips for it on youtube but couldn't find all of the clips...

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I wish they would do more to promote the sport. Its hard enough to find some of the dual meets on the BigTen Network. Even on nights where there are no games in Bloomington, not even the local networks cover IU Wrestling if they have a home dual. Thank God the student paper writes about every meet and tournament otherwise i dont think half of our campus would know that we had a team.

 

I think that if wrestling got more national coverage (like the NCAA tournaments being broadcast on a network) that more people would have a positive image of wrestling and we would see more wrestling movies coming from Hollywood.

 

I think a Vision Quest remake would be cool but i think i would have too high of hopes from the original. Maybe I'd like it if the coach made sure to wear a polo shirt and a freestyle singlet

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