Fast Break

I love this movie :) crazy script, very funny and original. Warm hearted.

It uses the old plot about a down and out coach whipping into shape a sports team filled with losers. And of course, there's the big game at the end, with a nail biting climax. Yet it works.

Why does this movie work? Because of many reasons. It's obvious the filmmakers took care to try to remove as many cliches as possible, and make it less predictable. More focus is on the characters instead of the old plot. The characters are more believable, and evolve through the course of the movie - they're likable. The "big game" is exciting, even though we know what will happen. Plus, there are a lot of big laughs in this movie.

This is a good film which is thoroughly entertaining with some snappy dialogue. None of the actors had really spectacular film careers but in this effort all came to the front of the class with very good performances. The cast mixes well. Without a doubt this is Gabe Kaplan's best effort, even overshadowing his TV role as Mr. Cotter.

I've seen nearly 1,200 movies, and this is my favorite. Not the BEST I've ever seen, but my favorite. Former Brooklyn junior high basketball coach-turned-delicatessen manager desperately wants to coach again. A small liberal-arts college in the Nevada desert wants him to build their team from nothing, for a salary of $60 for every game won. With the help of his playground-pickup-game teammate (New York Knick star Bernard King), he scours the streets for five great but undiscovered players. Then they go to Nevada, pick up a freshman quarterback in a school without football, and become an unbeaten sensation. Now the trick is to get nationally-ranked Nevada State (fictitious school filling in for UNLV) to play them in an exhibition game.

That's it; that's the plot. It sounds silly and contrived, like a T.V. sitcom meets an Horatio Alger story. So how come I loved it so much? How come in a list of favorites that includes The Godfather, All the President's Men, Sunset Boulevard and Rocky, this far lesser story of underdogs overcoming adversity is my greatest pleasure? Four things, I think: the characters are real, not cardboard cutouts, and they all have very real reasons for leaving New York for Nevada; Kaplan brings with him his "Welcome Back Kotter" sensibility for helping young people that everyone else has written off to achieve more than they ever thought possible; the film contains at least three hysterical AND original scenes, one of which would dubbed an all-time classic if 5 million more people had actually seen this film; and I'm not a sports fan, but the basketball games in this movie, especially the grand finale, are genuinely exciting. It's not ever going to make Halliwell's tome as a genre-defining classic. It may not even make your Saturday night video list. But it should.

Because it's real, it's fun, it's silly, and unlike more than half of what Hollywood feeds us today, it has a plot that keeps moving from the beginning to the end. And that's saying a lot.

Fast Break never turned out to be a film that would make Gabe Kaplan a major film star name. Still on its own itsbout a a man from Brooklyn who fulfills a dream of any sports fan.

Kaplan's sport is basketball and he's written hundreds of letters to colleges announcng his availability as a coach. He gets one reply from a ramshackle broken down college un Nevada, They'll pay him and he works cheap and comes with his own players.

Quite a collection too that include Harold Sylvester, Michael Warren and a secret weapon Mavis Washington who oes incognito to all in male drag. Her character provides some gender bending humor along the lines of Victor/Victoria.

The big day is when hs Cadwllader College team beats Nevada State coahced by state celelbrity Bert Remsen. Quite a game too.

Wome in the cast include Randee Heller and Connie Sawyer as Kapllan's wife and mother. Both are well cast in their parts.

As for Kaplan he incorporates a lot of his character and humor from his character in Welcome Back Kotter. I'm sure Kaplan regrets the decision he made to leave Welcome Back Kotter. It killed the series and he didn't obtain movie stardom. But we did get a good sports film from it.