The broader message of 1986's "Hoosiers"

Gene Hackman starred

Think back to when you first saw the movie "Hoosiers." It came out in 1986. It's receding back in time a fair bit now. The movie itself took us back to the early 1950s. It seemed in many ways to be a paean to that era of American life.
Shall we say bucolic? Comfortably post-WWII, white bread and uncomplicated in many ways.
It was uncomplicated partly or largely because we'd be uncomfortable tackling many issues. The "town drunk" in the movie was seen (through the lens of the time) as a person with character failings. "You're embarrassing your son," Gene Hackman tells the man. When he cracks up because of the untreated and misunderstood nature of his malady, it is pathetic and hard to watch. You'll remember Dennis Hopper played that role.
Hopper's stock as an actor jumped considerably. As for Hackman, he was always a natural in front of the movie camera. His character seemed identical to the one he played in the classic "Mississippi Burning." That movie like "Hoosiers" was a look-back. Hackman's characters were both driven and conflicted, as if some turmoil was stirring inside.
Only a grouch would want to be down on "Hoosiers." So endearing were the story and characters, you may not have initially noticed the over-arching theme with the whole flick. That is forgivable. It happened with me. The nostalgia, maudlin at times, can sort of drug you.
"Hoosiers" was all about second chances in life. The coach had nearly been thrown out of his profession. "Coach Dale" had to retreat for a few years, and this he did in the Navy, before dusting himself off, as it were, and finding an avenue where his past would not haunt him. So we get the tiny town of Hickory in Indiana where basketball is king or so the folklore holds. I'd say basketball is pretty big everywhere.
Nostalgia pulls us so hard, we can forget that states with the one-class post-season tournament system were horribly negligent and careless. The system screwed the small schools, naturally. We had this in Minnesota up until I was in my late teens, as I recall. And the new two-class system seemed hardly to erase the unfairness.
"Hoosiers" was inspired by the real-life Milan, Indiana. In Minnesota we had the comparable story with the little town of Edgerton. I smile as I relate that Edgerton had none of the dramatic backstories and conflict that we saw in "Hoosiers."
The public was entranced by stories like Milan IN and Edgerton MN. We might want to shed tears of happiness.
The worst hyperbole was to bring up "David vs. Goliath." Wait a minute, I did that in the Morris newspaper once, after a volleyball invitational in Morris in which we took fourth behind three teams whose combined school enrollment was less than ours. (I remember putting "combined" in italics.) I was reprimanded internally but that blew over. A parent of one of the players called to thank me.
The Morris school had a lot of significant issues that reached a head in the late '80s, and these did not go away completely in short order. I refer to the school and not specifically "school sports," because I maintained throughout that time that our school's problem was one of underlying culture.
The press people in the movie "Hoosiers" were completely incidental, off to the side, and to the extent we see them, we notice the big bulky old type of cameras. "The press corps" reminded me for an instant of the press guys in the parody movie "Airplane." "OK boys, let's get some pictures," remember that?
Connecting the "Hoosiers" storyline to my own personal storyline, maybe I was in position too for getting a "second chance" with my newspaper career. I had the talent to be a positive contributor all along. The school district-centered issues that reached a head in the late '80s resulted in my being pushed away from the mainstream. The mainstream was largely uncomfortable with the conflict - hardly surprising for any small community. The group of very well-intentioned "insurgents" never climbed to where they would represent the consensus. I'd argue they came close.
Merlin Beyer would later win a write-in campaign for mayor. But he and others, from my perspective, could never escape a certain taint from the conflict. And I was one of the "others." As with any small community conflict, sometimes sub-conflict even develops within a certain group. This is especially true if the group fails to obtain "victory" - perhaps "victory" is too blunt a term.
I worried that consensus was going to be elusive. And it would be elusive because of politics and friendships, a scenario that vaguely echoed the 1973 movie "Walking Tall" (Joe Don Baker).
So, taking the long way around the barn, I'm suggesting without seeking to show chutzpah that a character like me could have been woven into "Hoosiers." OK, I guess it's chutzpah. Give me a break, I've been pretty anonymous in this town since 2006. A writer and photographer with some egg on his face who rises to the occasion and delivers a dynamic, outstanding product worthy of everyone's scrapbooks! Hooray!
In my case, I'd still be derided in a knee-jerk way by certain good old boy types. The good news is that I think the Morris school is run in a totally constructive way today, near as I can tell, no insidiousness caused by cliques and such. So congratulations all. This isn't to say all our MACA coaches are God's gift to coaching - surely they are not - but we feel basically comfortable and happy with the system. Yes I have far more distance from it today. That's my assessment though.
 
A theme that reaches high
So, 1986's "Hoosiers" is all about second chances. It's a given, however I'd like to suggest this quality is more far-reaching than you think. I think it was all about a "second chance for America!"
Huh? I have long felt this, that "Hoosiers" was a strong statement that "conformity was back" in America. Really truly: consider that the heroic coach Dale constantly stressed that "my word is the law." And, "don't speak unless I ask you to."
The latter statement is especially shocking when you consider the backdrop of the late '60s and early '70s in America. I attended a state college in the mid-'70s when people like me got hopelessly enamored with the heroic cloak worn by "the press" in Watergate. Oh, and we were the principals in getting the U.S. out of Vietnam too, right? Actually I think we were. We en masse decided "the government is lying to the people" about Vietnam. So we became totally non-conformist. Combatively non-conformist. We would give no ground.
We weren't going to be fooled by "Tricky Dick's" sheep-dip. A virtual cauldron was brewing.
And the very schoolteachers across America whose job, it would seem, was to promote conformity (so we could all live together in a civilized way) began literally telling kids "it's not important to conform."
The realization by the mid-1980s was that America in spite of its warts was a commendable project or concept - let's embrace it. And toward that end, maybe we could press re-wind and just go back to the '50s with all its supposed "innocence." Never mind that it's largely a fairy tale, we just have to feel good about ourselves! To repeat: "we just have to feel good about ourselves!" Whatever it takes. America had made mistakes so we just had to move forward.
So let's embrace this fairy tale story about a small-town basketball team in 1950s America, nothing but charm abounding, wherein a troubled coach "with a past" overcomes all. So "Hoosiers" was about this big "second chance" for America, and could we pass the test? Based on all that is going on now in 2020 America, month of June, we really have to wonder.
 
Addendum: Just as we didn't get to know any press people in "Hoosiers," we were completely separated from the cheerleaders who most surely were there. They appear in fleeting scenes. Not one line spoken. Notice that? Did it bother you? Subliminally there was projection of women as complimentary players in American life, maybe? Surely the Barbara Hershey character struck everyone as an enigma. She had such a talent for having that kind of persona, mysterious and maybe not very pleasant like in "The Natural" with Robert Redford. Were you bothered by the doubt that swirled at the end of "Hoosiers" over whether Hackman/Hershey formed a permanent relationship? One second the two make eye contact amidst the celebration, then Hackman looks away rather grim-faced. That mean something? And why was Hershey so devoted to following the team after the little speech she gave in the school hallway that just seemed to diss small-town basketball?

- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com

"Tennis shoes," not real "athletic shoes"