Top 5… Best Sports Movies of the 80s

Keeping our sports and Olympics theme, today I’m looking at the top 5 best sports movies of the 80s. There were so many great ones to choose from and some that fell outside the decade that I wish I could include (A League of Their Own!). But here is my list! What movies would be on yours?

5. Wildcats

I’m a big Goldie Hawn fan, and this movie has her coaching a football team in an inner-city school. The team features both Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson in their movie debuts. This movie got canned a bit when it was released, but as far as new-coach-makes-good-in-poor-school-and-beats-rich-kids movies go, I think it’s ace!

4. Bull Durham

There was no way I was going to be able to make this list without including SOMETHING that Kevin Costner had starred in! Bull Durham is a baseball movie with KC as a veteran pitcher, Tim Robbins as a rookie pitcher, and Susan Sarandon as the team groupie who starts by bedding Tim but soon falls in love with Kevin – as would just about any woman!

3. Karate Kid

This was probably THE feel-good sports movie of the 80s. Who could forget Daniel, Mr Miyagi, and one of the most famous movie quotes ever – “wax on, wax off”. You must watch this, grasshoppers!

2. Rocky III and Rocky IV

The mega amazing Rocky franchise began in the 70s, but there were two great additions to it in the 80s – III and IV. Both have Sylvester Stallone as Rocky, the seemingly unbeatable villain (Clubber Lang in III and Ivan Drago in IV) and lots of great boxing action.

1. Raging Bull

I love boxing, so I might be a bit biased putting two boxing movies in the top positions! But I think you’ll agree that Rocky deserves to be there, as does this epic Martin Scorsese film. Starring Robert DeNiro as Jake LaMotta, it is a confronting, violent film that (if you’ll pardon the pun) doesn’t pull punches. DeNiro is superb in this role and Raging Bull remains one of the greatest sports films of all time.