Feel like getting some basketball-fueled insanity into your life, but can’t commit to all the brackets, betting, and institutionalized exploitation that is March Madness? GOOD NEWS: Basketball is also a fertile ground for filmmakers! Sometimes that ground sprouts weeds like Space Jam (fucking traaaaaaaash), but if you seek solid hardwood storytelling, find these films on the Portland Mercury’s shelf at Movie Madness (moviemadness.org) from Sun March 1 to Tues March 31.
Cornbread, Earl, and Me (dir. Joseph Manduke, 1975) A basketball movie that’s also a Blaxploitation classic about police brutality, driven by a cast of all-time greats (Moses Gunn, Rosalind Cash, Thalmus Rasulala), and the striking debut of Laurence Fishburne, age 14.
Fast Break (dir. Jack Smight, 1979) On release, it was knocked for “feeling like a TV movie.” But everything is TV movies now! So you can just… enjoy the charming and authentic late-’70s vibe via its shlumpy lead, Gabe Kaplan.
