Top five shitty Netflix sports movies

How these even became movies is beyond me

Braden Dupuis
Sports Writer

Let’s just get this out of the way. It should be no secret to anyone who’s ever browsed a Canadian Netflix account that the place is a goddamned cinematic wasteland.

Netflix Canada is where the bottom of the B-movie barrel goes to die a slow, unwatchable death. I knew that fact when I decided to take on this very important and culturally relevant work of sports journalism, but that knowledge alone wasn’t enough to prepare me for the god-awful shit hole that is Netflix Canada’s sports section.

 If for some reason you were planning on checking it out, do yourself a favor and don’t. Just don’t. Read this article, and leave it at that. Or, if you have a special place in your heart for masochistic self-loathing like myself, you can boot up your Netflix account and experience the pain along with me.

5. Soccer Mom

From Bogner Entertainment and Ladies Home Journal (seriously), it’s Soccer Mom!

A tale all the moms out there can relate to. Superficial suburbanite Wendy’s daughter hates her and she doesn’t know why! But we do – it’s because she’s a shitty mom.

Instead of making things better by being a better mom, Wendy does what any Prozac-snorting mother would do – she impersonates her daughter’s favourite Italian male soccer star to … inspire her or something? Fuck me.

Anyway, the results are grotesque and disturbing, enough so that I had to stop watching around the 20-minute mark. The whole thing is dripping in superficial suburban propaganda and it gave me the sudden urge to take two showers. It only placed at No. 5 on this list because of a brief appearance from comedy legend Kenny Bania. Gold, Jerry! Gold!

4. Hardflip

Sporting the tagline “What do you do when your life does a 180?” Hardflip drops into our emotional bowls and shreds at our fragile heartstrings.

When #coolguy Caleb’s mom becomes ill, he sets out looking for the father he never knew, also, skateboarding or something. At its core, Hardflip is really nothing more than a glorified skate video sprinkled with the traditional skater daddy issues most skate videos have the good sense to leave out.

Also there’s a fair amount of religious doctrine spouted through the mouth of a crazy homeless man for some reason. Isn’t that always the case? Anyway, watch Hardflip if you must, fellow bros, but be sure to have a box of man tissues nearby.

3. The Cutting Edge 3

At first I was hesitant to watch The Cutting Edge 3. Would I be able to keep up with the plot without first having watched The Cutting Edge 1 and 2? In the end I threw caution to the wind and just went for it, because I straight up don’t give a fuck.

When Zach’s figure skating partner gets injured, he recruits a rough-around-the-edges female hockey player to be his partner, but it’s not long before they fall for each other! And then there’s probably some accumulating conflict that builds to an emotional and fulfilling climax or something, because that’s how movies work.

To be honest, I didn’t watch a second of this movie, but Wikipedia told me it’s an ABC Family original (shudder). They also apparently made a fourth, because fuck you, shut up and watch it with your family.

2. The Winning Season

Dear God. As terrible as their selection is, Netflix writes some seriously awesome synopses for their movies.

“A school principal asks his drunken dishwasher friend Bill to coach the girls’ basketball squad, changing Bill’s life as he bonds with the team,” reads the synopsis for The Winning Season.

That was enough for me. I didn’t watch this movie, and I never will, because that synopsis nailed it. I don’t have to watch the real movie to know that the movie I created in my head after reading that synopsis is at least 95 per cent accurate.

Netflix, in an unprecedented act of corporate mercy, is now saving us the torture of watching their garbage by straight up beaming that shit directly into our minds. Well played, Netflix, and I must say, it’s about time.

1. Beach Kings

I watched three minutes of Beach Kings. It’s about a failed basketball player who tries his hand at beach volleyball, and it sucks. I know this, because I have eyes and ears and the slightest sense of critical awareness.

After hours spent slogging through Netflix: Canada’s sewer system, I’m left with more than a few burning questions. Who in their right mind would willingly subject themselves to this shit? Better yet, who in their right mind would star in, write, film, produce, or even green light this shit? And who in the depths of Satan’s sex parlour is making money off the idiot-faced assholes dumb enough to pay actual money to spend an hour-and-a-half watching a D-list actor play beach volleyball while spouting playground-calibre one liners?! Who, goddammit?!

This is why our politicians have no qualms in lying to our faces and bending us over repeatedly for their own ideological agendas – they’re comfortable in the knowledge that a large majority of everyday people are simply too fucking stupid to notice that they’re being fucked, and they should be. Wow. Sorry about that, friends.  I’m not exactly sure how I managed to turn this playful, Netflix-themed edition of the top five into a bitter commentary on the state of our modern-day political system, but there it is.

If you need me, I’ll be in the shower.

Photo courtesy of collinder.com