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The Stream Queen watches Love and Basketball
11 Plays3 years ago
It’s Black History Month and Valentine’s day is just around the corner. So, Gina Prince-Bythewood’s Love & Basketball feels like the perfect movie to watch. The Stream Queen is joined by J.C. DeLeon, co-host of The Hoop Ball Los Angeles Lakers Podcast, to talk romantic movies and basketball.
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Transcript
Introduction to Stream Queen Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
to all the ladies I am big it's the pictures that got small
00:00:14
Speaker
All this way for my advice, I feel like Oprah. Person your seat belts. It's going to be a bumpy night. What the hell? I'm not going to worry about if people accept me or not. I'm going to make Hollywood wherever I am at.
00:00:32
Speaker
As if!
Guest Introduction: JC De Leon
00:00:34
Speaker
Hello everybody and welcome back to the Stream Queen. If you've been following us, you know what we do. We love to watch movies by female directors and talk about them. And I am your host, Toppy Aletyodibo. And I have a new guest with me today and his name is J.C. De Leon. Hi, J.C. How's it going? Doing all right, Harry.
00:00:55
Speaker
I'm good. I'm good. I'm so glad that we could connect. If y'all remember in season one, I had such a great podcast with my friend, Stephanie. And Stephanie said, if you are going to do this movie, which we'll introduce soon, you have to have JC Lillian on here. He's going to talk so much about this movie and so much about everything concerning this movie because he loves it.
00:01:19
Speaker
And I was like, OK, yeah, this is great. Let's bring him on. And I'm so glad we were able to connect. Let me just give you all just a brief intro about who JC is. JC used to review movies, but he now does a podcast for the Lakers. And he's a big LeBron fan. So welcome. Do you want to tell us more about yourself?
00:01:43
Speaker
you know, rep yourself throughout your Insta, throughout your Twitter account, whatever you want. Yeah, if you follow me on Twitter and Instagram, you'll know pretty quickly, I'm a huge fan of LeBron James and basketball in general. And so, you know, we'll talk more about the movie. But yeah, this this movie was kind of made for me just because I love basketball so much and I have for a long time. And
00:02:09
Speaker
Yeah, the podcast I do is at Ethos Lakers for the website sportsethos.com. If you're into sports gambling, if you're into fantasy sports, that's a really great site and has a lot of information to help you do really well and then make some extra money on the side.
00:02:26
Speaker
Awesome. And I wonder if our listeners are guests trying to guess what the film is. So we'll just we'll just give it to them. We'll just tell
Impact of 'Love and Basketball'
00:02:34
Speaker
them what it is. So today we're going to talk about love and basketball that was directed by Gina Price by by the way, I'm.
00:02:45
Speaker
Okay, I'm just going to call her Gina Price because I don't want to like mess up the last part of her name. But she is awesome. And I didn't actually know that this movie was directed by her at all. I didn't even know this movie was directed by a woman. But looking back at her past work, you know, she or I get her work after this movie, she's done The Secret Life of Bees.
00:03:09
Speaker
Beyond the Lights, which I've watched and I really loved. And most recently, The Old Guard, which is available on Netflix. So it was kind of really interesting to see that this was kind of one of her first major pieces of work that was produced by the god Spike Lee. So this is just like really brilliant. And the film title pretty much tells you all you need to know about the movie. It's about love and it's about basketball.
00:03:37
Speaker
Um, so, uh, we have some like really great actors in this. Uh, we got Omar Epps. We got, I think Tyra Banks shows up in this at some point. Uh, who else? Regina King. Regina Hall.
00:03:53
Speaker
Really the hall, I mix up my Regina's all the time, all the time. And main character, Santa Lathan and Kyra, baby Kyra, I forget her last name, but so many great actors that you know and have seen in multiple films.
00:04:12
Speaker
Like, in the last 20 years. Yeah, there's also Stephanie wanted to make note, Alfre Woodard is in it. Alfre Woodard, yes. She's from Tulsa, Oklahoma, just like Stephanie is. Yes, lots of snaps, lots of steps to Alfre. Yeah, so just like some amazing top-notch actors. Ooh, and what's his face from 24, the president, the all-states guy.
00:04:36
Speaker
See, you got all the names. I'll just like describe the situations that I remember them from. So yeah, so this this film was, you know, I'll be honest, like I'm not I don't watch romantic films.
Personal Reflections on the Film
00:04:50
Speaker
Like it's not really my jam. But, you know, I wanted to drop this for kind of around the time when it's Valentine's Day and I wanted something a little different. And this was recommended to me by Stephanie
00:05:02
Speaker
uh who we get we should we should just brought her on this podcast because we're talking about her so much um and so like just yeah uh what did you think about the movie let's go into it yeah my my history with this movie is really interesting so i i grew up in an area of south texas and when i remember when i first stumbled across like the trailer for this movie and then you know way back in like 1999 or 2000 uh
00:05:29
Speaker
I instantly fell in love with the trailer and instantly knew that this is going to be a movie that I really love because I love romantic stories. I love love stories. I love sports movies. I love basketball. I knew everything about this movie was going to be made for me to really love it. The trouble is in South Texas,
00:05:48
Speaker
a lot of the theater, it didn't come out like huge nationwide. And so when this movie came on theaters, I had no way of seeing it. And for a couple of years, I like desperately wanted to see this movie and had no way of doing it. And it wasn't until I was a freshman in college and my dad bought me a PlayStation 2. And so now I finally had a DVD player. And so the very first DVD I went out and bought still had never seen the movie.
00:06:12
Speaker
But I knew that the DVD was out. So I bought the DVD for it at a Best Buy and immediately watched it and then loved it. And so, yeah, this this movie, to look at it back then, it had everything I really loved about stories, really great acting, really great romantic story. I didn't realize it at the time, but it's kind of funny to think about now, like,
00:06:37
Speaker
Omar Epps is not a very good basketball player, but- I could not tell. Yeah, they fake it pretty good in this movie. And it's just kind of funny that this is regarded as one of the greatest sports movies of all time. And like- Oh yeah, uh-huh. But now Lathan had to learn how to play basketball and Omar Epps. Yeah. I'm terrible at it. But yeah, that's- How would you rate her skill compared to Omar?
00:07:00
Speaker
I mean, her skill because she kind of learned how to do it. I mean, I'd probably give her like a six or seven. Omar is like maybe a three or four. Omar does have a lot of natural athletic talent because he's been in the program, which is also another reason why I love this movie, like going to the past. I didn't know anything about Sanaa Lathan, but I knew Omar Epps because I love Juice. I love the program. I like my gig too.
00:07:26
Speaker
I love higher learning. Yeah. And so Omar Epps being in this movie was just like, had so many elements going into it that I knew I was going to really love it. That's awesome. So like, let me go back because you say that you love, you're really into like romantic movies. Like what is it? Because we're like complete opposite here. Like I will avoid them at all costs. So what is it about them that you really love?
00:07:50
Speaker
I just love the hopeful factor of it. The movies that I do like are guys who aren't necessarily the most handsome guys. My favorite story of all time is If Say Anything and Lloyd Godley. Yeah, I love that. So guys that have a desire for a woman that may be a little bit out of his league or maybe they're not a perfect match, but for whatever reason, that infatuation is there. I identify with that.
00:08:20
Speaker
Yeah. And what would you say like is your favorite romantic movie? I mean, aside from say anything, I mean, the high fidelity is also another one. It's another movie. I do love that one. Him going through all those breakups and sort of analyzing like themselves and sort of what went wrong in those breakups. Yeah, that's. Did you ever see the TV show with Zoe Kravitz?
00:08:50
Speaker
I did. And it was it was really good. It didn't. It was it was harder to identify with that one because it was from a female perspective. But it had a lot of the same elements. And I thought and and I don't know as much about music, but I mean, I thought the music in that show and that show is pretty great, pretty great. OK, and then let me then ask you, what would be your favorite sports movie ever? I mean, aside from this one, it
00:09:19
Speaker
It might be maybe Major League. Nice. Yeah. This is a movie that people would always ask me when my favorite movie was, and I would always think about this one. But ironically, it wasn't until a year ago when Criterion released it and I was like, I'd always felt like this is a movie that wasn't super widely seen. I thought,
00:09:48
Speaker
You know, people who are into basketball and basketball players really love this movie because I hear about on like social media for NBA, Twitter, like people reference this movie all the time. And like Kevin Durant, who's an active NBA player, he
00:10:02
Speaker
was once engaged to a woman who happened to be named Monica Wright. And I remember when it happened, he tweeted about, like, I finally found my Monica Wright. And you'll constantly hear about basketball players. Yeah, you'll constantly
Cultural Significance and Inclusion in Criterion
00:10:17
Speaker
hear about basketball players looking for their Monica Wright. Oh, that's so adorable. Yeah, my basketball players really identify with this movie. And so much like, I love basketball so much, the girl that I liked in high school,
00:10:29
Speaker
was the best basketball player on the women's team. And I might've loved it because she was the best basketball player. But yeah, that was always sort of like what I was attracted to was also good basketball playing women. Yeah. And so I'd always thought that this movie had such a small niche when Criterion put it on their collection. I was like, oh, this is a pretty widely seen movie. And I started to reevaluate. And I'm like, yeah, I think this might be my favorite movie of all time. Yeah. I mean, it's a big deal.
00:10:59
Speaker
Yeah, to have your film selected to be in the Criterion Collection is probably one of, in my personal opinion, one of the highest honors. It's almost like being put in a time capsule, right? And generations from now are going to look back at this time capsule and say, these are the defining films of this era.
00:11:24
Speaker
that were so good and so impactful that they had to be preserved. So that's like how I see it. And so, you know, coming into this, I had heard of love and basketball and I think maybe the love part like threw me off because I watched like sports movies too. And so then, yeah, last night was when I watched it for the first time and I was like,
00:11:47
Speaker
Oh, this is really fascinating. It's like a different take on romance because it just throws in like so many aspects of life and, you know, the choices that you make, the choices you don't make, the choices that are made for you and just kind of like balancing love and career and how that can be really tough for like a woman.
Themes: Family vs. Career
00:12:11
Speaker
And just, you know, back then, because this was like
00:12:12
Speaker
This was released in 2000, so we're probably saying like filmed in the late 90s and we're still at a time where like.
00:12:18
Speaker
Women still have to choose whether they are going to go with the family and stay home and be with their kids, or they're going to pursue their career. Because we're still struggling with that whole, women can't have it all. And this was kind of trying to challenge that notion of what does that even mean? How do we even go about it? And so for me, someone who's not normally into romantic movies, I felt like this,
00:12:48
Speaker
drew me in from like a different perspective as like a woman who also was like pursuing her career but also trying to find love and also you know like how do I balance both like what happens when you are the successful one and like maybe your husband isn't successful or your your boyfriend isn't successful like how do you balance that and so for me I loved that that thread throughout and and what that meant to the characters
00:13:14
Speaker
Yeah. And when Gina first started writing this movie, the WNBA didn't exist. Oh, really? I didn't know that. Yeah. It's weird. She talked about in an interview I saw where she had the ending of the movie. And the ending of the movie is basically what you see at the end of the one-on-one basketball game. Yeah. And then the WNBA was created. And so she got an even more perfect ending. So she was able to get three perfect endings for this story.
00:13:44
Speaker
So was it always the intention for the WNBA to be created, or do you think that this film maybe pushed that a little bit? What impact do you think that they had on each other? I feel like if the WNBA hadn't been created, I think she probably would have gone back to Spain and Quincy would have gone with it. Yeah. Yeah.
00:14:07
Speaker
Okay, so it seems like the kind of it fit perfectly for it to be the way it ended. So yeah. So okay, well, what else do you like about this movie? Like what, what is it about it outside of the stuff you've mentioned that you just glum on to? It does.
00:14:27
Speaker
For from like an athlete's perspective, like as a sports movie, it does kind of show a lot of what you can kind of go through, you know, whether it be in college and practices and like fighting you, you know, injuries, things like that. It's yeah, it's got everything as far from from just an athlete perspective. They came out. I graduated in 2000. So like I would have left when I was a freshman in high school because I would completely changed how
00:14:55
Speaker
I approached everything about sports in high school, and I probably wouldn't have played football. You played basketball instead, you think? Yeah. I played both. I played football because I was good at it and I'm a pretty big guy, but it was never my favorite sport. For being a pretty big guy, I was always a better basketball player than people. People would look at me and not assume I could be a good basketball player, but that was okay.
00:15:21
Speaker
Um, and so, um, and so, yeah, this was just, yeah, everything motivational. Like I've heard stories about me and basketball teams, especially women's basketball teams, like before tournaments, though they'll get together and watch this movie. Um, and even, even as I get older, looking at it today, like.
00:15:47
Speaker
So many movies have come out back then or even before then that are problematic now because they're misogynistic or they have things that are problematic today and this movie has almost none of that.
00:15:58
Speaker
Yeah, it was really interesting how they framed the women's team and the women in that movie, but also the men too. I think maybe this is probably the female gaze that we're looking at where the way that Omar's character, Quincy, is framed. He tries to be this hard guy, tough, popular,
00:16:26
Speaker
like um you know a womanizer really but not really but deep down he's just like a big soft guy right and she really plays with that nuance and we see it so it's not he's not a one-dimensional character and so even though there are times where you're like you see him acting all like yeah i'm too cool for school
00:16:46
Speaker
You're like, Quincy, what you doing? I know that you're a little teddy bear. You have seen that part of him, and you know that he's capable of it, that you kind of root for him to make better decisions. But like he says towards the end, it's like, I was lost. A lot of it was made out of fear of not being able to trust people after someone that he looked up to, that he had a lot of fate and had ruined that trust for him.
00:17:15
Speaker
You can kind of see the parallels in real life of men in real life who maybe they look up to their fathers or they look up to their mothers and how that can impact their relationship with other people.
00:17:28
Speaker
that have nothing to do with the situation that even happens. So, yeah. Everything about it feels really authentic. His reaction to his father's revealed infidelity. Yeah, like that's something I couldn't identify because my dad never did anything like that, but like I can't really imagine. Yeah. His reaction to everything, well, those choices might seem bad. They do seem warranted and kind of understandable.
00:17:54
Speaker
And he was trying so hard. He was like, I don't want to be that person. But almost in trying so hard to not be that person, he was almost like falling down that path. He kept repeating the same mistakes that his father was repeating, even though his father was like, this is going to happen. These women are going to throw themselves at you. Don't give up on school just yet. And he's thinking that he knows better, and he's going to try to do different than his father. But in a way, kind of,
00:18:23
Speaker
ends up in a similar situation. Yeah, it's got so many lines that echo as pieces of advice where he tells his dad, why couldn't you be the man you tried to make me? I've always thought about that. If I ever have a son of my own, I'm going to think about that line. Yeah, that's going to resonate with me forever.
00:18:44
Speaker
Yeah. And like I really identified with Monica Wright because I remember being, you know, that high school kid that hated dresses. Like my mom would bring it like just as her mom brought that yellow dress out, my mom would bring the dresses out and I would try so hard to hide them deep in my closet. I think sometimes I would even try to hide it in my brother's closet. Like just
00:19:09
Speaker
So then she wouldn't find them. I just wanted to be a t-shirt and jeans girl. And I really just identified with- I know you like soccer. Did you play soccer? I did. I played, but I was more like a track person. I did a lot of hundred-beater dashes, short, distant races. And at some point, they were considering me to go
00:19:34
Speaker
to the national level. And so all of that pressure and all of the whole coach experience, I could feel that. But yeah, I was the girl who was always on track. I was running. I was doing all of the different Olympic sports that I could because I wanted to compete. And I remember there was this kid at school
00:19:57
Speaker
who ended up being a professional soccer player anyway, and he would always be like, I'm fasted in you. The whole interaction between Quincy and Monica when they're 11, we had that whole interaction. We were 12 years old, and he was just like, I'm fasted in you. We had a whole one-on-one race where I beat his ass.
00:20:18
Speaker
And I still hold that to this day where I was just like, he might be a professional soccer player, but when I was 12, I ran faster than he did and I'd beat him in that 100 meter dash. So like, I could just, I was getting all these floods of flashbacks from high school and just like identifying with the experience and this character so well, so well done, so well
Real-life Sports Parallels
00:20:44
Speaker
done. Yeah, and that's another thing. Yeah, I think people,
00:20:48
Speaker
like about this movie is like maybe you didn't end up with your high school sweetheart but you'll you can remember
00:20:55
Speaker
you know, who, who you dated at the time, or like, in my case, who I was interested at the time, and like, and like her and I would, you know, would play basketball occasionally. And I would always go to her games and things like that. And yeah, so that's sort of things that I, there's a scene where as soon as she falls out of a game, the first thing Quincy does is he leaves because she's not gonna play anymore. And like, I've done that. Yeah. Yeah.
00:21:21
Speaker
I mean, that was sad too, but I was like, are you not going to stay and make sure she's okay? Because you could just see her, particularly that last game where she was like, I'm never going to make it to college ball. And that disappointment, I felt that right in my core, just the sobbing on the sidelines and trying to hide your face. There were so many of these moments that
00:21:47
Speaker
felt so real, so authentic. So, you know, like I could walk into that basketball court anywhere in the country and see those emotions play out and see those situations play out. And I think she did such a great job with that. Yeah, absolutely. So like, what would what would you say is like your favorite part of the film? I mean, it changes
00:22:15
Speaker
I like the idea of playing basketball overseas, I think is a pretty cool thing to me. Like I know a lot of people's dream is to like make it to the NBA, but I think there is something kind of cool and interesting about like
00:22:32
Speaker
playing professional overseas. Like I know a couple of people who have done it. And I follow a lot of, and that's sort of something that's still true today. I follow a lot of WNBA players and the WNBA season is so short. A lot of them are still able to also play overseas. And so like,
00:22:49
Speaker
especially now with social media, they'll post their highlights and everything like that from a EuroLeague. When I worked at Flow Sports, one of my favorite things they used to do was they used to broadcast a EuroLeague basketball. And so I was maybe the only person who was into watching it. It was really cool. I didn't even know that that was a thing. When I was watching it, I was like, is it really professional over there?
00:23:18
Speaker
So that's actually like a real thing, like going. Yeah. OK. You're you're an American player who it's sort of like soccer in reverse. You're an American player who's maybe older, isn't as good in the NBA anymore. You can make a couple of million dollars playing in China. Oh, wow. Yeah. And and vice versa. If you're a college player who's popular, you can make a pretty decent living playing overseas.
00:23:47
Speaker
I suppose also at that time when they didn't have the WNBA, that was your literally only option if you wanted to keep playing was to try to seize and keep your skills sharp and just keep going with the sports.
00:24:03
Speaker
or end up working in a bookshop as one of them did, which is so sad. Like I just I felt so sad hearing that, you know, and, you know, knowing that, you know, men's basketball, like you could go from high school to college, from college to pro, you know, or, you know, go straight to pro. I don't know how it works. You probably can tell me that. And then after, you know, you have like endorsements and whatever. And for women, it's just like go overseas or end up with like
00:24:30
Speaker
a regular job. It just felt, yeah, I was kind of heartbroken to hear that. And you know, like, it is real and it did happen. But yeah. Yeah, that's, that's one of the things that's interesting today. Like so many things get remade and at 22 years old, like some people
00:24:50
Speaker
think this might be able to. But I mean, we talked about earlier, nothing about it is really problematic. The only thing that could be updated today with things like name, image, and likeness, how college players can basically make money off of their own image now, that's how it could be updated. But I don't think you'll make a better love story than you could. No, I don't think so. And just speaking about
00:25:16
Speaker
I feel like even though the main movie was about Quincy and Monica's love stories, there are other little love stories going on that had issues. And one of the things that, you know, like I mentioned in the beginning, this whole struggle for a woman to choose between her career and her
00:25:36
Speaker
family. We saw that with Quincy's mom, who basically gave it all up when she got pregnant, even though his dad made it seem like he gave it all up. But she doesn't have a career. She stays at home. Her whole life is dedicated to where he goes, where he's stationed.
00:25:56
Speaker
And then, you know, following up with her son, too, where he's going, where he's stationed. And, you know, similarly with, you know, Afri would his character, you know, she's like, when they had that blow up in the kitchen, she's like, I had dreams. And then I got pregnant with your sister and then you came along and then I had to put that dream on hold.
00:26:14
Speaker
And, you know, it's a completely different generation. And I think you do hear that even today, where, you know, there are, um, families where, like, the mom, Chloe had stuff that she wanted to do, but for whatever reason, her dreams were caught short or she was pressured into, like, going towards family and a career. And I, what I loved was, and I think Alfred would have character, but she's like, you have such a fight, such a fire in you.
Exploration of Generational Themes
00:26:43
Speaker
And it was like,
00:26:44
Speaker
Monica wanted to kind of cut or end that cycle of just ending your dreams prematurely. And at some point you saw that she was almost about to give in without that pep talk from her mom and finally just pushing through
00:27:06
Speaker
to that ending, I was like very happy with that ending. Absolutely joyous because I know that like if this, if that film was made like maybe 10 years prior or maybe 10 years after even, she would have just continued working at the bank or she would have, it would have been flipped and Quincy would have been the one playing basketball and she would be the one on the sidelines with a baby because she gave it all up for him. And I think that that would have been a very disappointing ending for me. So I loved it.
00:27:35
Speaker
they told all of these stories, all of these different peoples whose dreams were cut short. Even the girl she replaced at USC or was told that she replaced, you know, was she wasn't going to make it. But then that girl ended up pregnant and couldn't go. So it's like all of these dreams cut short because women have had to make those choices. And she she was just like, I'm not. Nope, this is my dream. I'm going to keep pushing it. I might lose my love. I might lose. I might not be able to hang out with my family, but I'm going to keep
00:28:04
Speaker
going in. Yeah, that was something that really identified with. Yeah, that's that's something I also do like about the movie is as you know, like as much as I did when I saw when I was 18, as I get older, I do see those elements that become more evident that that an 18 year old wouldn't see. You know, the first time young Sanaa looks at her mom when her dad brings in two shirts, like, which one do you think she's like picks one? He's like, well, iron them both.
00:28:32
Speaker
When she gives her mom that look like that. Yeah, that's something I didn't really figure out until I was like much older It was like iron your shirt your damn self Your arms broken Yeah, one of my favorite lines is how strong of a character off reward is one of my favorite lines Oh, are they cursing at mamas in Spain now? Yeah, I love that. That was I was like, I need to remember that and put that in for later But yeah, no she
00:29:00
Speaker
She was she was also like a favorite side character. Like I want to call her a side character because Alfred is a like a protagonist. OK, like that's her role. But wherever she is, she always shines. You know, she always comes across as the main character. And you could tell that even.
00:29:17
Speaker
without Sanaa noticing it. Her mom was already paving her path throughout. She was sad that she didn't go to her games, but she was like, I'm doing other things to make sure that you can.
00:29:33
Speaker
make those choices. And I think that as me growing up, I see my mom in a different light now than I did when I was in high school. Again, because you think those choices are like, why are you doing this? Why aren't you pursuing your dreams? But then when you look back and see all the things she would have had to sacrifice in order to do that, you understand why those choices were being made. Yeah, absolutely.
00:30:02
Speaker
So if you could say like you were the director of this movie and you could go back and do, or you could remake it, like what would you change? What would you do differently? I think even though the story is mostly about Monica, I think there's interesting things to explore about Quincy's character. They could have gone to both.
00:30:27
Speaker
as a fan of basketball in general, one of the things, this is probably a little too early in 2000, but I mean like social media and the way basketball clips go viral on Instagram and things like that, like that would be an interesting element to add. Especially since Quincy basically kind of failed, like there's
00:30:49
Speaker
There's a couple of instances of some pretty famous high school basketball players that would go viral. And people would think they're going to end up being amazing basketball players and just nothing becomes of them. One of them has a documentary called Man Child about how he failed to make it. And one of the reasons why I was so intrigued by LeBron James, because I did first see him when I was in high school.
00:31:14
Speaker
And the first time I saw him, I was like, this kid's not going to fail. He's going to end up being a great basketball player. And he didn't. He ended up being a great basketball player. And so to more further examine Quincy's failure, I think, would have been interesting. But it would have taken away from Monica's story a little bit. Yeah. And I think that maybe she tried to do that. But it was like a brief moment where he's two weeks away from marrying Tyra Banks, who, congratulations, that's quite a snag.
00:31:44
Speaker
But he realizes that his pursuit of glory in basketball and being like the best basketball player in the NBA is more to do with his father, right? And he had to come to terms with
00:32:00
Speaker
the fact that he's trying to be better than him. He's trying to, you know, I guess maybe replace that loss that he had of this great guy who he looked up to. And I think once he and again, that goes back to what you were saying about like the lack of misogyny in this movie about just men being in touch with their feelings, men doing that like emotional, psychological work.
00:32:24
Speaker
to like realize, oh wait, I am messing up. I need to, I need to really think back and figure out like where I went wrong. And to be able to have that self-awareness to say, I was lost. I made a mistakes.
00:32:39
Speaker
I'm going to do better. I'm going back to school. I mean, I guess if this was made today, he'd probably have endorsements. And so he probably wouldn't need to go back to school, but he probably should. Because education is important, like his dad said. So I love that aspect of it, that he was able to see that this wasn't what he wanted, right? He he was chasing something that was unattainable. And I think once that realization was had, it really opened the path for them to
00:33:07
Speaker
be able to have a future together because for her basketball was everything like she lived it she breathed it she was like you know just every day that was it for her and he saw that in her and you know just to call out to all you men support you women's dreams like you know it's it i mean we laugh about it but i mean think about it there's there's always this struggle
00:33:30
Speaker
And I saw that kind of in maybe the third quarter. I love how she split the movies into quarters. That was another thing I really loved. But let's say third act, third quarter, where there's that fight between them. And he's arguing about her always putting her career first. And that's a conversation that I think that a lot of people have had with their partners about, is my career more important in your career? And for women, it's like,
00:33:57
Speaker
when you have that history that goes back, hundreds and hundreds of years of you putting your career on the back burner to be with a man, to let their career thrive. I think that a lot of people will really relate to that conversation.
Reflection on Film's Ending and Partner Support
00:34:13
Speaker
But that's why I really love the ending of him being on the sideline with your kid and just supporting her, knowing that he's done that work to realize, I'm cool being this person.
00:34:25
Speaker
And I wonder if that makes the ending better. And I'm comforting that. I'm comforting that so many men do really do like this movie because I feel like it's something that they should really pay attention to. Because at the end, you know that Quincy's going to be a great father to that girl. Yeah. Oh, absolutely.
00:34:41
Speaker
He's he's learned all those lessons and he's done. Like I said, he's done the work. So, you know, and there's that I don't know when you watch the DVD, you saw like the post credit scene of the little girl throwing the basketball in the hoop and we're like next gen like, you know, like it's going to you know, he's going to be there supporting her as well. And I'm going to basically be the role model that Monica's dad was for her in basketball. So that was just like a lovely little like
00:35:12
Speaker
Little thing at the end for that. Yeah, so overall, like, what would be your rating for this movie? I know you already love it, but like, give it to me out of five stars.
00:35:24
Speaker
Um, out of five stars, maybe like four and a half. Like this is how much I like, out of all my tattoos I have, this is the only, you know, it's an audio medium, but I have. It's the only film tattoo I have out of all my tattoos. And so. You should put Spalding on it.
00:35:44
Speaker
Well, the NBA ball is actually Wilson now. Oh, is it? Oh, man. That was a great gag in that. Who's going to the prom with Spalding? Yeah, Spalding was the NBA sponsor of the ball for like 30 years. And this year is actually the first year it's Wilson.
00:36:04
Speaker
Yeah, four or five stars. I think that's pretty good. And for me, I probably give it about that much, like four, four and a half. I think the I think there are some things that I probably would change. I mean, there's nothing that I would actually change. I just remember being very invested in like Monica's character and be like, no, he's in the wrong.
00:36:25
Speaker
He should be supporting you as you make it in basketball. Why is he being such a dick about this? And me just yelling at the TV. And I think at one point I was like, Quincy, you better have a condom. I remember yelling that. I was like, she's not going to get pregnant. Because of course, I've never watched this movie before. So I was like, oh, man, if she gets pregnant and drops out, I'm going to be so mad. So again, I was heavily invested in this very fictional character.
00:36:54
Speaker
um but it turned out that she was gonna be all right good head on her shoulders and all that so yeah um again thank you so much is there anything else you want to tell people about this movie that they would want to know going in um no it's just it's it's not gonna have like it's typical
00:37:14
Speaker
ending that every romance movie has, it resolves itself in a different way. But if you've never seen it, if you love love stories, if you love sports movies, there's no reason why you wouldn't like this movie. And let me, out of 10, how would you rate the basketball in this, like, just the whole basketball concept in this movie? The overall basketball. Because it's filmed in a really good way. So maybe a seven.
00:37:40
Speaker
the seven. Okay. There's some basketball movies that are really bad. Like a lot of people like the basketball and Teen Wolf.
00:37:53
Speaker
Yeah, it's a hard thing to film. It really is, yeah. And especially Omar Epps talked about in one of the behind the scenes I saw and they were prepping a shot and they were warming up and he was like hitting jump shot after jump shot, couldn't miss. They went to lunch, came back from lunch and he couldn't hit the shot. Oh no. And then take after take and he was like, well, we're going to be here until I hit the shot. Oh my gosh. But yeah, that's just kind of the way it goes.
00:38:21
Speaker
That would be very frustrating I think after you've kind of just been nailing it to just like lose the magic like right after. Actually one of the shots that I really loved was I think it was that last game she had in high school before prom and you know she was trying to
00:38:41
Speaker
get the emotion out of it, really just focus on playing the ball, right? And they changed the camera to her POV and her inner thoughts. And I love that. That was like, again, when it comes to like shooting action in sports, that was something that I hadn't really seen before.
00:39:01
Speaker
Um, I mean, I haven't watched a lot of sports movies, but from what I've seen, you know, like you might have the POV, but the thoughts where she's like, focus, focus on the ball, focus on where she's going, like all of that to just kind of kind of train herself to just play it.
00:39:17
Speaker
not just to impress the people who were on the stands and the coaches that were out there, but just for herself, like to train herself to like get the game. And I thought that was like pretty fantastic. So nice work Gina on that one.
Conclusion and Gratitude
00:39:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:39:32
Speaker
And that brings us to the end of this episode of the Stream Queen. Love and Basketball is available on HBO, HBO Max, to stream. Or you can get it on a Criterion Collection and have it permanently, not only in your home, but in your heart, like JC has done. And so yeah, thank you so much for chatting with me on this movie. It's so nice to get somebody who loves sports and loves romantic movies to kind of talk about it. I feel like I got a completely different perspective from you, and I love that.
00:40:01
Speaker
And so for everybody who hasn't watched this movie, please go see it. And if you have watched this movie when we drop it, feel free to leave some comments and tell us what you think about it. And remember, you can subscribe to figure out when the next podcast episode is dropping. There's going to be some cool movies that we have for this season, and I can't wait for you guys to hear it. So yeah, thank you so much. And this is your Stream Queen. Bye.