Following on from our rundown of the Kevin Costner baseball trilogy consisting of Bull Durham, Field of Dreams and For the Love of the Game, I felt it was only right to touch upon the other two Costner sports movies in this series of films that perhaps best perfected what made Costner the star that he was. With his return to working with Ron Shelton, the 1996 golf based comedic romantic drama Tin Cup and his latest sports film effort, the American football based drama Draft Day, from Ivan Reitman. 

Tin Cup (1996, Dir. Ron Shelton)

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Nobody can underestimate the absolute knockout nature of Bull Durham with any audience and at any time in life, this is an opinion that I feel is actually held by an awful lot of people. So where does Tin Cup fit into this? The Costner reunion with writer and director Ron Shelton, on another sports film-comedy-romance-drama, this time focussing on golf. Because although Durham is certainly the better of the two and a far leaner beast, Tin Cup really does have many of the same glorious joys and heights of that Baseball outing, with many changes that make it a lot more than a carbon copy just swapping the bats for clubs. Costner appears this time around as Roy McAvoy, an interesting amalgamation of the sturdy and mature character he played in Durham and the brash and looser character that he taught played by Tim Robbins. Costner here is a more rebellious soul, still dashingly charismatic and sexually invigorating as before, but now with more a down on his luck shclubby angle. Yes, Kevin Costner can be shclubby in a movie, and it can be believable. The plot of the film follows Costner as he takes great strides to rekindle his golfing capability in  the world of the pros and the US open to steal the heart of Rene Russo’s Dr. Molly Griswold, who he has immediately fallen head over heels for after she came in for a golf lesson. The magnetism and chemistry of this pair is undeniable and lends to the films looser and more freewheeling nature to have a real centre about it. The interesting power dynamics of the intelligent woman falling for a more physically focussed male is a again very reminiscent of Durham, but no less effective here, with Russo hitting just as many homeruns as Susan Sarandon did in that film. The main issue of the film lies in the reasoning why the good doctor has come for a lesson; because she just so happens to be dating Don Johnson’s David Simms, a pro golfer and old acquaintance of Costner, and massive a*shole. Johnson is delightful as this purely vile figure we completely love to hate. However the love triangle isn’t tedious with Russo actually have some good chemistry with Johnson too, so that it’s not a case for the first hour of the film of us wondering why on Earth she doesn’t just jump on Costner from the get go. Although the love is the core of the film, as it continues a great focus is placed on MacAvoy’s golfing career and the stresses of his fading pure talent. A climactic sequence with a very prickly shot is the stuff of pure sports movie glee with the exact sort of rapturous conclusion that we so wish for, whilst also touching base on the ramifications that will come of it. Tin Cup is a truly delightful feature that remains humorous, sexy, romantic and frequently dramatic to this day.

Draft Day (2014, Dir. Ivan Reitman)

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What if you shot a movie about sports but without any sports sequences with the exact same styling and visual fury that you would shoot a typical sports film? That’s what you get with Draft Day, where trade disputes on the day of the NFL draft are delivered like action sequences and fuelled by intense dialogue and powerful if melodramatic performances as we fight the draft to perfect team. Now let me get one thing straight; is Draft Day a great film? Probably not. Is it a very watchable and enjoyable and at times ridiculous good movie? Hell yes! Costner stars this time around as Sonny Weaver Jr. in this feature from Ivan Reitman, returning as he is known to do in his career to the sort of movies that were made in the 80’s and 90’s. Those great days for films when these sorts of mid-budget movies crammed with stars would make money and would get made. This however did not make money and was actually nowhere near as interesting as the actual NFL draft that year, as the announcer Jon Gruden was quick to comment “this is better than Draft Day”. That seemed to be the opinion among many for some time, however despite its frequently ridiculous plot contrivances, for all its downfalls Draft Day is still a great chance to view Costner just steal the show for long stretches at a time. I can’t vouch for some of the truths of the American football being presented, as I frankly don’t know the first thing about the sport, however I can comment that Draft Day is a fun blast of a movie that feels like a time capsule to a bygone era. The joy is infectious actually, with almost the entire ensemble going for broke with their performances. Frank Langella’s sunglasses wearing club owner is a fierce foe that hovers like Dracula at every turn (and yes, that joke was inentional for those that got it). Chadwick Boseman is a great and believable sports star. Jennifer Garner and P Diddy it seems were the only ones that didn’t get the memo to play it a little bit over the top. I really do think this film wouldn’t work half as well if were not for the insane nature of the script and many of the baffling camera and editing choices. Draft Day is nowhere near a perfect film, but it does give us some great late era Costner and frankly that’s all I want from this film.

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What made and what makes Kevin Costner such an incredible and watchable actor is his old Hollywood nature, seemingly imbued with the quality of a modern actor. Modern and old-fashioned are terms that do get bandied about an awful lot, but I think Costner does sit perfectly in the middle of them both. I strongly believe that no series of 5 movies better shows his skills as an actor, nor as a Hollywood star, than the 5 that had him in the world of sports. Well obviously JFK too, but you get the picture. 

-          - Thomas Carruthers