Hoop Dreams (1994)
Speaking as a proud 1996 graduate of Arkansas State University, and a former classmate of Arthur Agee, I'm embarassed to admit that I just got around to seeing this one.
The documentary lives up to the rave reviews that it has received, and most of the synopses I've seen of it do a pretty good job explaining the concept. Two 14 year old boys from the projects in Chicago are recruited by the exclusive private school that bred basketball great Isaiah Thomas. Both of the boys are naturally gifted players, and have different struggles in their families with drugs, crime, and poverty, but circumstances sway them in many different directions. The film was originally intended as a short film, but turned into a feature that covered 4-5 years of these boys' lives, and came in at a runtime just shy of 3 hours.
I just finished watching the movie, and have started watching it again with the commentary track of Arthur and William, and am really digging hearing the two of them interpret the story and the relationships between all of the characters. I would cheerfully recommend this film to anyone...a great story, very well told.
Arthur and I were majoring in the same department at ASU, and had a couple of classes together. I remember him liking to clown around in class from time to time, but I remember him quietly slinking into the back most days, and talking very little. We had all heard about the movie, but I don't think anyone I knew had seen it. I remember Arthur talking in class one time about being from the projects in Chicago as a way of explaining something in class, but that's really about the extent of what I knew about him. I think I have watched about 5 ASU basketball games, and only one or two as an undergraduate. Our basketball team usually posted winning records, which is more than I can say for our football team, which chalked up a total of 5 wins in my first three years there (and going 6-5 my senior year, winning the last 4 games straight). But me and my buddies weren't really big fans, and the basketball games weren's much of a draw. Women's volleyball, on the other hand, was a different story. We had a great team, and most of them were hot.
I was decent friends with another basketball player named Henry Kimbrough, and him and Arthur were pretty tight. I mention this, because he's the tie I have to one really good Arthur story. Henry and I were in a class called "Advanced TV practices," where we were the crew members for our daily news broadcast. It was one of my favorite classes, and a lot of fun, in spite of being challenging work. The news majors were the anchors, and we were the crew, and there was always kind of an "us vs. them" mentality, which made for good unit integrity. But I digress.
One one day in advanced TV, I was the sound guy. The sound booth was in the back of the control room in the corner, and probably the most fun places to be, because there was nothing to do besides adjust volume knobs. And you had to play a CD before the broadcast for everyone to jam out to. I remember Alanis Morrissette being the regular rotation, but on that particular day, I had "green onions" on loop, and everyone was into it. We also used to joke around on the headsets a lot, and that's about what I was up to. Henry walks in, opens up a notebook, and slides a little photo folder marked "Platinum Plus" (Memphis gentleman's club) out of the bottom onto the board. I picked it up, and opened it, and there was a picture of Henry, Arthur, and Porn Actress Nina Hartley, who was naked as a jaybird. She had her arms around their shoulders, and they each were holding a leg.
Henry told me that when they walked in the door of the club, she recognized Arthur right off, and told him how much she loved his movie. Arthur's response was "I love your movies, too baby". They wound up hanging out all night.
I was partially influenced by the limited dealings I'd had with Arthur when I watched the film, but mostly, I was influenced by interesting people with an interesting story, very well told. It also made me realize that I was wrong about him. At the times our paths crossed, I saw a lazy jock who didn't really seem to take anything seriously, and who coasted on his talents as a basketball player. But the reality is that that was the one thing that he seemed to do exceptionally well, and he used it as best he could to get somewhere with it. His path was by no means an easy one.
I remember that Arthur was about a year ahead of me in school, and he signed to play basketball in Canada, and learned on Wikipedia that he also played Slamball, and now teaches a life skills curriculum at high schools throughout the country. So he never made it to the NBA, but he's still playing ball. And that's cool. I learned through this movie that he's a rather complex man who was doing the best he could with what he had to work with. I can respect that.