Whats the trick to directing a sports movie?
Gosh, that’s a really good question. Sports movies are always about something else, ultimately. Sports just happens to be the engine in most of the best ones. They’re usually relationship dramas. Before reading the book, I’d already done a sports movie and didn’t want to be pigeonholed. But I read it and realized that this is a sports movie in the way that “Jerry Maguire” is a sports movie. Sports is just the engine for what I think is an unconventional mother/son story. Also, I think it’s really important to be as realistic as possible with the way you portray the sport. Sports fans know the difference. They can tell. Is it possible to do a good sports movie that’s not fact-based? Absolutely, it is. The thing is, the two I’ve done, “The Rookie” and “The Blind Side,” they’re both too-good-to-be-true stories, but they are true, so you have to be careful with that. With these feel-good stories that have these elements, it’s difficult. You couldn’t do either of these movies if they were f
