GOLF GOES TO THE MOVIES


MARK GORTON HAS BEEN WATCHING FILMS INSPIRED BY THE GAME OF GOLF AND DEVISED A UNIQUE RATINGS SYSTEM TO INFORM YOUR VIEWING CHOICES


EAGLE: Must watch BIRDIE: Jolly good PAR: OK BOGIE: If you have nothing better to do BLOB: Avoid at all costs


TIN CUP (1996) The unlikely connection of


the words ‘golf’ and ‘romantic comedy’ is made in a pleasing manner by this vehicle for Kevin Costner. Meet Roy McAvoy, another golfing underdog, but one cowed by life and clinging on to a puppyish charm. A washed up professional of great talent but precious little ambition, he owns a grim driving range in West Texas. When the girlfriend of top pro, David Simms, turns up asking for a golf lesson, “Tin Cup”


McAvoy is instantly attracted to her; and then badly bruised when Simms also shows up and appears to invite him to play in a local tournament – only for Roy to realise that Simms merely wants him to act as caddie. Roy’s combative spirit begins to stir. What’s more, as luck and the script would have it, Dr. Molly Griswold is also a clinical psychologist. And Roy is in dire need of some help with the inner game. So, taking shape is a triangle as potentially hazardous as Amen Corner – can Roy McAvoy defeat Simms and win a major? Can he win his arch-rival’s girl? And, in the process, can he win back his self-esteem? The answers are no, yes and yes, because it is in Roy’s character to “go for it”. The climax of the film is peculiar inasmuch as it is unusual for Hollywood to celebrate losing. On the 18th, as Simms plays the percentages and lays up short of water guarding the green, Roy takes out a fairway wood and attempts to carry the ball some 230 yards. He doesn’t make it. He tries again. And again. At last, after much heartbreak, his 12th shot makes it on to the green and rolls agonisingly into the hole. But all is not lost. On the contrary, the girl has been won and Roy has finished high enough up the leader board to qualify for next year. And, most important of all, he is a better man. Tin Cup is a decent, lightweight film but golfers and non-golfers alike can learn this from it. Kevin Costner had barely played the game before it was made and spent just months achieving such a level of proficiency that many of the great shots he is seen to play were not cheated by editing or executed by doubles. Maybe it’s not as difficult a game as we choose to think. Rating: Birdie


56 ROYAL LIVERPOOL GOLF CLUB MAGAZINE 2013


HAPPY GILMORE (1996) The sporting underdog makes another appearance here, only now he is barking mad, and affection for this film


depends on your response to star, Adam Sandler. Happy is a would-be ice hockey pro who possesses a powerful shot but is to skating what Pavarotti was to hang-gliding. He also has anger management issues and a poor grasp of etiquette. When Happy learns two things – that his grandmother’s house has to be sold to pay a massive tax bill, and that he can hit a golf ball 400 yards, the Fates conspire to turn him into an unlikely pro determined to win serious money. Happy’s big-hitting talents are noticed by club pro, Chubbs Peterson, whose professional career was ended by an alligator that bit off his right hand. A victory in a local tournament elevates Happy to the ranks of the Pro Golf Tour (a thinly disguised PGA Tour), where he quickly makes an enemy of egomaniac star, Shooter McGavin. Shooter stops at nothing to undermine Happy, including the hiring of a demented fan, Donald, who is instructed to heckle Happy at every opportunity. This doesn’t help Happy’s putting – which is appalling. As the film’s climactic tournament approaches, Chubbs takes his protégé to a crazy golf course for putting practise and gives him a putter fashioned in the shape of a hockey stick. In return, Happy, having killed in a previous competition the alligator that bit off Chubbs’ hand, presents his coach with its head. Shocked, Chubbs staggers backwards, is defenestrated and falls to his death. To cut a long story short, the lunatic Donald crashes his VW Beetle into a TV tower on the 18th green with Happy and Shooter neck and neck. Shooter makes his par. Then the tower collapses, blocking Happy’s route to the hole for birdie. Now his crazy golf training comes in handy as an extraordinary trick shot navigates the wreckage and sends the ball into the hole. Victory! And all is right with this world and the one in the hereafter. The film ends with Happy receiving congratulations from a ghostly two handed Chubbs, Abraham Lincoln – and the alligator. Rating: Bogie


BOBBY JONES: STROKE OF GENIUS (2004) From a movie-making point of view, Bobby Jones had, on the one hand, matinee idol good


looks and an irrepressible will to win. On the other, he enjoyed a privileged upbringing, was never the underdog, and had few demons to wrestle with apart from perfectionism, a temper and a taste for the booze. To make matters worse, he was ferociously clever, finding time to become expert in engineering, literature and the law. Films tend to abhor very smart people, unless they are madcap and eccentric. So Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius (which probably lead some people to believe that his career was ended by a burst blood vessel), sets out to make Jones more interesting. His underdog status is conferred by stress laid on his sickly childhood, a time when he was encouraged to play golf because he could not take part in rougher sports like baseball. His bad temper – he was no stranger to walking off a course mid-competition – threatens to undermine his dreams of glory. His devotion to the game takes him away from his wife and causes marital tension. And his fondness for a drink begins to look like alcoholism. Truth is, a man who played the loneliest game so beautifully and found he had no golfing peaks left to conquer aged just 28, must have been bound up in a complexity with which the film cannot deal. And from a Royal Liverpool point of view, when we discover that the screenwriters have relocated the 1930 Open Championship to St Andrews, there is little else to do other than doubt the general veracity of the story. The producers had been given the backing of Jones’ descendants and permission to film at both the home of golf and Augusta. Doubtless they thought, “Hoylake? Where the hell is that?” If they had waited a couple of years until 2006 they would have known the answer. Rating: Bogie


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