Cinema’s 10 Fiercest Athlete Rivalries

Sports films love to shine a spotlight on rivalries… and these are ten of the absolute best, from drama to comedy.

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Becoming a great athlete is like achieving greatness in anything; it takes immense amounts of focus, patience, time, dedication, competitiveness, and above all – hard work. Some are blessed with genes that make them more naturally suited for certain activities than others, but ultimately there is no short cut around the factors it takes to become great.

Before someone can begin this lofty pursuit, they need something driving and inspiring them to do so, and few things prove more motivational than a rivalry. Rivalries make for great competition, thrilling entertainment, and captivating stories, and these are the silver screen’s ten fiercest.

10 Doug Glatt & Ross Rhea – Goon

Most cinematic rivalries follow a similar arc: rivals initially despise each other, then slowly learn to respect, appreciate, and admire one another over the course of their rivalry. The opposite is true with respect to the two hockey enforcers in Goon (2011).

Ross (Liev Schreiber) is a legendary fighter and the idol of bar bouncer Glatt (Seann William Scott). When Glatt joins a team and earns his own tough-guy reputation, he’s crushed when Ross promises to knock him out if they ever meet, setting up a violent confrontation in the season’s pivotal final game.

9 Crash Davis & ‘Nuke’ LaLoosh – Bull Durham

Rivalries are usually between opposing players, but they can be just as fierce between players on the same team, like in Bull Durham (1988). Crash (Kevin Costner) is a veteran catcher who’s considered a great teacher, but not a great player, which is why he’s spent his career in minor league baseball. LaLoosh (Tim Robbins) is a hotshot rookie pitcher that throws fast but wild.

Crash mentally grooms LaLoosh for his ascension to the majors, but things get complicated when they compete over the same woman (Susan Sarandon), although that’s just the surface of the bitter resentment between the two.

8 Björn Borg & John McEnroe – Borg Vs McEnroe

Before Federer and Nadal, the greatest tennis rivalry was between the Swedish Björn Borg (Sverrir Gudnason) and the American John McEnroe (Shia LaBeouf) in Borg vs. McEnroe (2017), which follows the lead up to the 1980 Wimbledon final, the first of several historic meetings between the two legends.

They don’t appear to hold much personal animosity for each other, but their styles couldn’t be different. The world’s top-ranked player, Borg is machine-like in his placid demeanor, whereas the upstart McEnroe is animated and volatile. The story demonstrates how a great rivalry pushes both competitors further than they could’ve gone without each other.

7 Billie Jean King & Bobby Riggs – Battle Of The Sexes

Unfortunately, there aren’t many movies depicting female athlete rivalries, perhaps because they’re often unjustly undervalued compared to their male counterparts, which is exactly the focus of Battle of the Sexes (2017).

The arrogant Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell) – a retired male tennis pro – boasts he could defeat any female player in the world, even at his age of 55. After he defeats the top-ranked women’s player, former top player Billie Jean King (Emma Stone) challenges Riggs in a highly-anticipated match for the pride of her sex.

6 Peter La Fleur & White Goodman – Dodgeball

Dodgeball is rarely the subject of movies, but Dodgeball (2004) gave the sport a well-deserved stage and an entertaining rivalry between La Fleur (Vince Vaughn) and Goodman (Ben Stiller).

A rivalry that extends beyond the court, La Fleur owns Average Joe’s Gym, while Goodman owns the much larger Globo Gym, and both players captain the official dodgeball teams for their respective gyms. When they meet in the finals of a Las Vegas dodgeball tournament, their gyms, livelihoods, and lots of money are all on the line.

5 Jacques Mayol & Enzo Molinari – The Big Blue

A sport not traditionally accustomed to movies is the focus of The Big Blue (1988) – diving. Rarely does a rivalry span the course of a lifetime, but that’s the case between Jacques (Jean-Marc Barr) and Enzo (Jean Reno), who compete as children diving for coins on the ocean floor in Greece.

As adults, Enzo and Jacques are the world’s greatest freedivers – swimmers who hold their breath while sinking to the lowest possible depths. As the two battle over world records, they risk their lives pushing each other to their physical limits.

4 Daniel LaRusso & Johnny Lawrence – The Karate Kid

Combat sports naturally lend themselves to personal rivalries more often than team sports because the competition is between individuals, and few individuals hate each other more than Daniel (Ralph Macchio) and Johnny (William Zabka) in The Karate Kid (1984).

When Daniel moves to Reseda, he befriends Ali (Elisabeth Shue), a classmate at his new high school. When Ali’s black belt ex-boyfriend Johnny sees this, he and his dojo friends make Daniel the target of relentless bullying, inspiring Daniel to learn karate himself, and take them all on in an exciting tournament.

3 Happy Gilmore & Shooter McGavin – Happy Gilmore

Adam Sandler has a few sports comedies to his name, but his first one – Happy Gilmore (1994) – introduced his fiercest rival in Shooter McGavin (Christopher McDonald).

When Happy (Sandler) discovers his natural golf abilities and joins the professional tour, his immature rock-star style makes him a fan favorite, but he’s resented by veterans trying to preserve the game’s sanctity, especially Shooter. Shooter goes out of his way to make Happy’s life hell, stooping low enough to buy Happy’s grandmother’s house out from under her, but Happy gets the chance to win it back in an unforgettable championship showdown.

2 James Hunt & Niki Lauda – Rush

Few rivals have pushed each other more in competition than the British Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and the Austrian Lauda (Daniel Brühl), two of the best Formula 1 drivers to ever compete.

Ron Howard’s Rush (2013) depicts their fierce competition over the 1976 F1 championship, which was the focal point of their long and tense rivalry, one that stretched back to their Formula 3 days in 1970. Their styles, strategies, and ascensions to F1 couldn’t be more different, making for an entertaining story about the thrilling sport.

1 Rocky Balboa & Apollo Creed – ‘Rocky’ Franchise

Not many cinematic rivals can claim a relationship that plays a major part in six different movies, that’s why the entertaining and complicated arc between Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) and Apollo (Carl Weathers) sets the gold standard for athlete rivalries.

The rivalry begins in Rocky (1976) – the 1977 Best Picture winner that sees heavyweight champion boxer Apollo get a greater fight than he bargained for when he takes on the no-name challenger. The rivalry heats up in a rematch in Rocky II (1979) before evolving into something much different in subsequent movies, including the new Creed (2015) franchise.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/cinemas-fiercest-athlete-rivalries/