• Wide Release
• Director: Jack Smight
• Written by: Marc Kaplan, Sandor Stern
• Running Time: 107 minutes
• Language: English
• MPAA Rating: PG - Parental Guidance Suggested
• Cast: Gabe Kaplan, Harold Sylvester, Michael Warren, Mavis Washington, Reb Brown, Bernard King, Bert Remsen, Randee Heller, Connie Sawyer, John Chappell, K. Callan, Rhonda Bates, Marty Zagon, Richard Brestoff, Doria Cook-Nelson, Steve Conte, James Jeter, Larry Farmer

Can’t honestly call myself a fan of sports movies as they always seem to run aground at around the midway point, raping clichéd formula for whatever trinket of originality that might exist -- and it’s just a matter of pushing through to the end. “Fast Break” does all the same stuff, but shit, if it wasn’t a shallow wading pool of joy watching this. Yeah, I dug this flick! There’s something to be said for a film that factors in a theme that, strangely, feels ahead of its time – ahead of its time now, not then. What happens when a player, one that prides himself on his masculinity, finds himself becoming increasingly more attracted to another player on the team? Forget the obvious; that the player is actually a female disguised as a boy, the feelings are real, and the genders are the same – at least in the eyes of the homophobe standing in front of the coach declaring his sudden romantic feelings for “the fag” on the team. I loved this moment in the film, even if a preposterous contrivance launched it.

New York City delicatessen worker and hardened basketball enthusiast David Greene (Gabe Kaplan) is offered a coaching job at Cadwalader College in a rustic area of Nevada. The school doesn’t have much money, hence their reason for trying to prop up their cost effective basketball program, thus Greene is only offered a paltry 50 dollars a game… and only if they win. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel, however. If Greene can somehow figure out a way to trounce Nevada State, one of the top tier collegiate teams in the US, he will be set up with a three year contract paying him 30,000 dollars for each of those years. As expected, he jumps at the chance to live out his dream. His wife, Jan (Randee Heller -- best known as Ralph Machio's mom in "The Karate Kid"), ever the ambition killer, suggests that his dream of coaching is child’s play and elects to stay behind in New York. How’s that for a supportive other half.

Before taking the big leap into full court oblivion, Greene immediately sets out to form a core to work from, one that he can take with him out to Nevada -- trekking rundown buildings, pool halls and churches, in search of those former high school basketball players that impressed him, but have since faded away into the obscurity of street life and mediocrity. Like Greene, they have slowly watched as time eroded their chances at basketball greatness. Things are about to change. For Greene and them, this is their chance at a Fast Break into success. He finds D.C. (Harold Sylvester) in a rundown building surrounded by drug dealers on the look out for cops. He helps religious conman Tommy 'Preacher' White (Michael Warren) make a quick backdoor exit as a flock of churchgoers contemplate sending him to meet his maker. Hustler (Bernard King) is only too happy to join Greene, as his days of pool hustling in New York are looking bleak. Everyone is on to him, it seems. Last but not least, there’s Swish (Mavis Washington) – the best looking of all the players. Swish is an amazing talent, who has been accepted into another school on an academic scholarship. Sadly, she (yes, she) wants to play but she realizes that a livelihood in basketball for females is non-existent except in some cursory role (remember, this was before the WNBA). Greene wants her to play for him, on his team, but in doing so, he asks a favour of her -- subterfuge. Roberta must become Robert. Another player, one of the few white players recruited by Greene, Bull (Reb Brown), a muscle bound oaf with a heart of gold, wears even the most hard and fast racists on his team down by film’s end.

In clinging to so many other films of this ilk, each of the players has a quality or a problem -- something that sets him apart from the others and they must work through them in their own fashion and style. Generally this machination bulks up the off-court/non-sports side of the film and generally it works, if you want to allow yourself to let go long enough to let it work. For DC, it’s that he has trouble with tests – that is until he is given a part-time tutor. Sadly, for him, a barefaced homophobe, it’s the “faggy" guy on the team, Swish, who is assigned to him. For Swish, hiding her breasts (and femininity) under a layer of tape and faked machismo, it’s those romantic tingles she feels for DC and must keep bottled up for fear of outing herself. It is the culmination of this emerging story line that provides the film with its greatest and most memorable moment, as I mentioned earlier. For Greene, it’s the idea that he can’t enjoy his sudden success with the person he loves the most in the world – his wife. And, yes, there’s success. Greene’s particular easy-going coaching style relaxes his players enough that they are able to come full-bloom on and off the court. In a great scene, utilizing Hustler’s particular talent, Greene is able to jostle Nevada State head coach Bo Winnegar (Bert Remsen), an old fogie, cowboy hat wearing, racist, into playing his team for all the marbles. Who do you think will win? Take a guess.

Gabe Kaplan (1981's "Nobody's Perfekt") as David Greene, is an odd cat, for sure. He’s essentially doing his ‘Welcome Back Kotter’ shtick only with a different group of equally impressive but lesser known actors around to bounce his jokes off of. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. More often than not, it does. Kaplan himself has a strange kind of herky jerky comedic style that seems mindful of another actor Billy Crystal -- so much so, in fact, you'd swear that Crystal was copying Kaplan. With many of the same quirky ‘I’m-smiling-when-I-shouldn’t-be’ type of mannerisms in his arsenal, it’s interesting watching as Kaplan works his magic even when the scene doesn’t necessarily groove along with him. The cast of young actors on hand here, starting with Harold Sylvester (1992's "In The Deep Woods"), is impressive. Many of them, namely Sylvester, went on to long careers in movies – longer than Kaplan, who like the character in the early part of the film, seemed to fade away into obscurity sometime in the mid 80s. Wrapping up a little too nice and neat for my liking, the ending will at least leave everyone with a big smile on their face which is, I suspect, the filmmaker's intention all along. I enjoyed this film immensely and I suspect you will too.

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