As you can tell, I'm not a fan of Woody Harrelson, but especially when this film came out I was quite a fan of Wesley Snipes. But I have to begrudgingly admit that Harrelson is right for the part and does well here. And Snipes is great here, and near the peak of his career.I'm also not a basketball fan, or of sports in general...another reason I know this is a really good movie. It's race, but it's not racial. And what I mean is, both the white and the black main characters have massive flaws and are just trying to get through their lives as best they can. Harrelson's character come out a bit pathetic, but I've know people like that...who just seem lost in life. I question the inclusion of actress Rosie Perez here. Her voice grates on me something awful.The plot is pretty decent. Two hotshot amateur basketball players meet up and find they can score pretty well on the courts. But, there's plenty of tension between them, but also the seeds for a lasting friendship. The Jeopardy angle is "cute". This is one of those films I pull out about every 10 years to watch again.I watched it this time, but didn't think the Blu-Ray version was of particularly good quality. Okay, just not Blu-Ray definition.

I had heard of this film a few different places, but because of a Channel 4 countdown programme focusing on one of the lead stars, so I had to see if it was a worthy performance, from director Ron Shelton (Bull Durham). Basically former college basketball player Billy Hoyle (Woody Harrelson) makes a living hustling with street ballers who assume he can't well, because he is white, and his most recent play is with black arrogant but talented player Sidney Deane (Wesley Snipes) on Venice Beach. After being defeated twice and losing his money, Sidney thinks he could be useful, so he goes to see Billy and his girlfriend Gloria Clemente (Rosie Perez), who are on the run from mobsters demanding a gambling debt paid. He suggests a partnership to hustle other basketball players for money, but they lose their first game playing together, and Billy finds out that he was conned himself, and Gloria knows this. They go to his house and an appeal is made to Sidney's wife Rhonda Deane (Tyra Ferrell) and they agree to split the winnings and carry on a more trusting partnership, and they do win an honest game together, due to the ability to distract. Sidney does mock Billy about his inability to slam dunk, claiming "white men can't jump", but their friendship continues with playful bickering, but when they lose another game and of course the cash, Gloria leaves Billy. Sidney knows how he can win her back however, he has a friend who works as security for the studio that make the popular game show Jeopardy!, which she has dreamt of being on, and so he arranges it so she can be a contestant, and she gets the subject she knows best, leaving with a $14,100 prize. Billy wins Gloria back, but then Sidney gets burgled, so desperate for cash and knowing he owes a favour asks his fellow hustler friend to play a final game, but Gloria says she will leave if he gambles again, but he goes against her wishes. The end sees Sidney and Billy win this final, and the mobsters are paid, but it appears Gloria wasn't lying about leaving, but the friendship remains, and they walk away having a basketball banter. Also starring Cylk Cozart as Robert, Kadeem Hardison as Junior, Ernest Harden Jr. as George, John Marshall Jones as Walter, Marques Johnson as Raymond, David Roberson as T.J., Kevin Benton as Zeke and Nigel Miguel as Dwight 'The Flight' McGhee. Snipes gives a fun slick performance as the streetwise cool guy, Harrelson is equally great as the pro basketball playing white guy, and Perez also shines as the pro's sassy girlfriend, it is a film to enjoy for the basketball, the dialogue based jokes, and the small moments of serious stuff too, a most worthwhile sports comedy drama. Wesley Snipes was number 96 on The 100 Greatest Movie Stars. Very good!

White Men Can't Jump is a fanciful but ultimately effective meshing of a number of things to overall formulate a satisfying picture. Its amalgamating of inner-city grit which comes complete with hearty, tough minded souls looking to intimidate and endorse masculinity is mixed up with a buddy genre comedic slant that comes in addition to a romance plot-line as well as particular undercurrents of race relations drama. The conventions and content happen to blend and mesh together with one another rather well, all of it formulating together on their own levels to create a decent piece. Additionally rife with elements of queer theory, the film is principally one of which a relationship must exist between two characters which will then go on to be vital for both its and their successes, and although on face value this is one of a heterosexual ilk that might exist between one of the leads and his New Yorker girlfriend, it is actually one of which exists between the two leads, of whom are both male. It's in this sense that the film is ultimately about the rivalry and potential for danger which exists between two men; the understanding which the pair of them undergo of this that exists between, as well as the acceptance of one another which their misadventures and particular relationship drags them toward.Like varying recent films of a similar ilk, ranging from Tony Scott's 1986 film Top Gun to Zack Snyder's highly stylised, 2007 postmodern war film 300; White Men Can't Jump is about the bonding men undergo and the manly activities in which they partake in the apparent hope at forging masculine identities. The two men in question are Woody Harrleson's Billy Hoyle and Wesley Snipes' Sidney Deane; two fairly young and wholly fit males whom enjoy the sport of basketball so much so that it will come to act as the manly catalyst for each of their respective on-screen plights, just as engaging as a fighter pilot did for the leads in Top Gun and engaging in warfare did for the scantily-clad warriors of 300. Featured in all three examples are loose sub-plots to do with the supposed connection to that of a female character whom only feels predominant, and is often sidelined for the ties the men have with one another which are able to push through. Here, the most interesting material to do with relationships features its two leads; the case-in-point being that by the time the film has veered somewhat off piste and into a sequence encompassing a TV game show which serves only to endorse the film's lone heterosexual relationship, we are not as interested nor engaged as we were when its two male leads were on screen clashing with one another, on one occasion bickering during a match like an elderly couple.Hoyle and Deane live locally and maintain relationships with their female partners which come complete with mites of discontent, although Hoyle is additionally in trouble with some gangsters to whom he owes a fair amount of money and believes himself to have escaped to here: Los Angeles' Venice district. Their first encountering of one another is indeed on the highly masculine and ego-centric basketball courts of Los Angeles' Venice Beach, as sinking shots from the dusty tarmac for large sums of money before gloating is the order of the day. Where Sidney appears loud mouthed and full of himself, Billy is more reserved and restrained; his victimisation at the hands of Deane and his companions sees them drag class as well as race into the situation when Hoyle, being white, has a "country club" tag attributed to him and deemed unworthy within the sport's field. Hoyle promptly beats Deane and his crew, with the minimum of fuss and we are able to visibly see Deane's slight wilting under the pressure as he becomes the victim to his own manliness.As Hoyle leaves the courts, his worn and sweaty figure is captured post-workout by Deane's gaze: he is wholly impressed by the man's abilities; so much so that following him home and coming in to exclaim his true feelings occurs. Away from the courts, Hoyle's girlfriend Gloria (Perez) is a hardened academic, buried in encyclopedias and academia in an apartment which has been decorated by pictures of famous people. She comes across as being on another level to him, both literally or spiritually in this sense as well as academically; their only true link to one another that of a healthy sex life, since Hoyle is unable to truly engage in her brainier characteristics bar offer her the odd compliment to do with his belief she'd be able to win a TV game show. Hoyle's eventual tryst with Deane will see them both occupy a realm upon which basketball acts as the all-linking catalyst which sees them click, and this is easier and more familiar for him than that of his girlfriend's demands. Crucially, White Men Can't Jump goes on to document the failing of a bond with a woman that one of the main characters has; a telling sequence nearer the end encompassing the pair of protagonists practically walking hand in hand being symptomatic with the newfound homoerotic understanding.Director Ron Shelton has an eye for the on screen basketball, of which he has of sorts rendered a ballet in that there are degrees of dance or presentation behind the characters' lyrical boasting and verbal jousting before the physical stepping up to play the sport finishes the performance off. There is enough to get involved in, overall; the looming sharks provide ample threat for Hoyle as Deane attempts to get on with his real estate career and finding a proper home for his family. The film is a mixed bag of sports movie clichés; interesting insights into the lives and minds of basketball hustlers and droll formula linked to past-tragedies; epiphanies and moral choices but it all hangs together and works on the whole.

A movie that on the surface appears to be about sport - basketball- has a much deeper undertone if you look closer, a movie that uses the sport as a metaphor for the distinctions between blacks and whites in America. I've always loved this movie, i first saw it many years ago when i was about 14 and felt the wit and chemistry between harrelson and snipes is top notch, now im older i see things i didn't see before. Personally i feel you can take the movie in two ways. you either see it as a buddy comedy or a movie which shows how blacks and whites view each other. the way in which snipes is presented may be a cliché - black man, ultra confident, feels that coz hes black hes better than harrelson - but is this a cliché? most of the black guys in the movie feel that harrelsons character billy is a 'chump', and are quick to put him down. even the movies title 'white men cant jump' is a thinly vieled reference to the viewpoint of black America. this is not a racist perspective, its simply how it is, sidney (snipes) even gets into a discussion with harrelson about jimmy hendrix, about his apparently white drummer and how billy cant listen to hendrix, he can only hear him. billy for his part, uses the fact that hes a white guy to his advantage when he and snipes are hustling. these class colour elements serve to make white men cant jump a far better movie than it is given credit for, and is worth a better look if you think its just another sports comedy. David Ford