LIKE MIKE (2002) **1/2 What is it about basketball.why aren't there many good basketball movies? Baseball has way more than its share, but that just goes to show how baseball is the sport of choice of the (American) cerebral set. Football has that warrior thang, so that's built-in drama, you know? And hockey is that violent/goofy/wacko hybrid, so it's king of a demographic that can't be moved. But basketball, basketball is more rhythmic.ain't none of them sports inspired a song nearly so cool as "Basketball Jones," but the movements of basketball.the naturally syncopated elegance that is not only the visual core but also the secret to the success of so many masters (Dr. J, Pistol Pete, Michael, Magic.most everyone except the huge guys and Larry Bird).it looks great but there's no more plot in it than a Johnny Ramone chord. So they feel like they have to go too far out of their way to build different stories around the game. Here, happily, that works. Orphans, Bow Wow lookin' more than a little bit like Allen Iverson and facin' down the man hisse'f, yeah, that's cool. Crispin Glover as a very bad man, so bad that maybe you have to rate it R just because he's in it, yeah that works. Tell you what else works man, Morris Chestnut works, he's such a good actor that I thought he was a basketball player instead of an actor, because he's playin' a basketball player.
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