Film delivers 'Champion' inspiration

It was a last-minute decision. Terry and I saw the marquee at Newport's Roxy Theater announcing that "Champions" was playing. As the Roxy is only open on weekends — and it was their Sunday matinee — it was now or never if we were going to see it locally on the big screen.

How to talk about it without making this a spoiler for those who haven't seen the film — and may decide they want to do so. I wondered about the comedy billing. Mental disability is not usually something to laugh about, but the story held plenty of heartwarming funny.

And, in fact, the learning-disabled characters — played by themselves — were the teachers in this movie. They opened a world and a way of seeing that showed me how blind I can be.

Here is what happens — without saying all that happens. The win-at-all-cost minor league basketball coach — with the slate-like heart — gets fired and ends up with community service for a drunken driving charge. He lands in a gym coaching a learning-disabled teen basketball team with their own ideas about how to play the game.

The best player will not play for him. No reason — just says, “Nope.” There is a stunning reason, we discover later. The rest of the team gets plenty sidetracked. One kid insists on heaving the ball backward over his head, never coming close to the hoop.

It's an all-boys team until a fireball girl — returning from an injury — shows up. She knows what to say — how to say it — and when to say it to rally the team. They are heading for the Special Olympics. The “don't mess with me” coach is finding he likes these kids.

Besides the gym drama, the movie looks into the private lives of the teens. One can't make most games because the restaurant owner never lets him have time off from his dishwashing job. Until he does the unheard of — and makes a stand. Another is still living at home with his mom — when he wants to be in the group setting with his friends — because his dad left when he was born and in his mind, “Good guys don't leave.”

There are other side stories, but the focus is the team and their quest for the Special Olympics tournament — and what happens there — with its surprise ending. Another plus is the movie's great soundtrack.

The disabled teens are a group of friends — and that is the name of their basketball team, Friends — who model both foibles and personal victories. They are loyal and determined and honest and encouraging of one another. They have few filters for hiding behind. Where do you get that kind of realness in a “neurotypical” world?

They've met with prejudice and meanness in their lives — the usual hurts when you're human and don't measure up to somebody else's standard of what a human should be. Their intellectual challenge isn't something they chose — but they have forged a meaningful life with what they have.

"Champions" is a movie that turned the tables — and made me feel on the outside wanting in.