The Hoosier state has been fertile ground over the years for some of the best sports movies Hollywood has ever produced. Indiana's legendary status as the childhood home of basketball competes regularly on the silver screen with storied institutions like Notre Dame and Indiana University.
It was Bob Cook of NBC Sports who said, "If you want to make a great sports movie, just set it, or film it, in Indiana." It's a piece of advice that has held steady for almost a hundred years now, and these five are just the cream of the veritable crop.
5. Knute Rockne All American
"Win one for the Gipper!"
It's a memorable line, often quoted and even more often imitated. But, sadly, many don't remember that it originally came from this film in 1940.
The film follows Knute Rockne, the famous football icon, through his days as a player, teacher, and coach at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. Among his many accomplishments was the development of something many modern football fans would not be able to imagine the game without: the forward pass.
Indiana Trivia:
- James Cagney competed fiercely for the lead role, but the Notre Dame, who had total control over the film's production, would not allow him to partake due to his public support of Anti-Catholics in the Italian government.
4. A League of Their Own
Although this film is the only one on this list that doesn't take place in Indiana, it was shot largely right here in the Hoosier state. Neither the Rockford Peaches nor the Racine Belles, were from Indiana, but the stadiums for both teams, were actually League Stadium in Huntington, IN and Bosse Field in Evansville, respectively.
Indiana Trivia:
- The bar scene was supposed to be filmed at "The Hornet's Nest" in Evansville, but after the owners renovated the bar for the shoot, the producers decided to change locations because the bar no longer had the "feel" it once did.
- Many props, signs, and honors to the fictional Racine Bells and Rockford Peaches are still standing at the Indiana stadiums where the teams "played."
3. Breaking Away
Against all odds, Breaking Away, a film about a little-known event revolving around an unpopular sport, became an instant classic. Exploring themes of love, family, and the declining industrial class, it displays with a deft hand the plight of the American working family, perfectly crystallizing the reality of boarded up factories standing next to burgeoning universities, all within the familiar story of "Townies" vs. students.
Indiana Trivia:
- The townies call themselves the "cutters," (as in Stonecutters) in honor of Indiana's bygone heyday as a mecca of Limestone production. The real life cutter team, so named in honor of the movie, has become the most winning team in the history of the Little 500.
2. Rudy
Heartwarming, heartbreaking, uplifting, inspirational... it's hard to choose which term to describe the true story of Daniel "Rudy" Reuttiger, who was always an underappreciated son, an overlooked brother, and an average football player, but who followed his dream and strived for greatness at the world's greatest football college, just the same.
Indiana Trivia:
- The game scenes were filmed during halftime of a real game between Notre Dame and Boston College in 1992.
- Rudy and Knute Rockne All American are the only two movies the University of Notre Dame has allowed to be filmed on their campus.
1. Hoosiers
Almost certain to be mentioned in any conversation about great sports movies, Hoosiers was the small town basketball story that in part celebrated Indiana's legendary status as basketball country, and in part helped to create it.
Released, probably not coincidentally, during the prime of Larry Bird's career, one can imagine the basketball legend being on that team.
Indiana Trivia:
- Not surprisingly, small towns all across Indiana claim that Hoosiers was filmed in their little community. What is surprising is the fact that they're all right. It was filmed in and around twelve different small towns and neighborhoods all across Indiana, from the Brownsburg suburbs to Butler University.