This Sporting Life (1963)
UK
Director Lindsay Anderson
Screenplay David Storey
Original Story David Storey
Producer Karel Reisz
Director of Photography Denys Coop
Art Director Alan Withy
Costumes Sophie Devine
With Richard Harris (Frank Machin), Rachel Roberts (Mrs. Hammond), Alan Badel (Weaver), William Hartnell (Johnson), Colin Blakely (Maurice Braithwaite), Vanda Godsell (Mrs. Weaver), Anne Cunningham (Judith), Jack Watson (Len Miller), Arthur Love (Slomer), Harry Markham (Wade)
Runtime 134 minutes
DVD: USA, 2008 Produced and Distributed by The Criterion Collection (Region 1) Aspect Ratio 1.66:1 Sound Mix Monaural
Extras New, restored high-definition digital transfer. Audio commentary featuring Paul Ryan, editor of Never Apologize: The Collected Writings of Lindsay Anderson, and David Storey, screenwriter and author of This Sporting Life. Theatrical trailer. Lindsay Anderson: Lucky Man? (2004), a short documentary from BBC Scotland featuring interviews with many of the director’s friends and collaborators. New video interview with Anderson’s first producer and close friend Lois Sutcliffe Smith. Meet the Pioneers (1948), Anderson’s first film, a documentary short about a mining engineering firm. Wakefield Express (1952), an early documentary by Anderson about the town that later served as the setting for This Sporting Life. Is That All There Is? (1992), Anderson’s autobiographical final film. Additional booklet featuring a new essay by film scholar Neil Sinyard and an article by Anderson from 1963.

Lindsay Anderson’s first feature film, This Sporting Life, remains a defining achievement of the British New Wave. It aptly exemplifies that movement’s preoccupation with social realism, as well as the ideological concerns shared with the Angry Young Man movement in British literature and theatre. Although ostensibly centered upon the story of a struggling rugby player, the film actually reveals itself as a complex cinematic portrait of failed relationships and human despair.

Unlike later Anderson films such as If… (1968) and Brittania Hospital (1982), This Sporting Life is not an explicitly political work. Although it does deal with working-class issues, the film avoids the subversive anti-establishment tone of these other works. Rather, This Sporting Life reveals Anderson’s masterful attention to character and the details of human interaction. The film’s main character, Frank Machin (Richard Harris), embodies the quintessential “angry young man.” He represents the conflict between masculinity and personal anguish, which lies at the center of the film. As Neil Sinyard notes in his accompanying essay to the Criterion DVD release, This Sporting Life precedes later Martin Scorsese works such as Taxi Driver (1976) and Raging Bull (1980) in its creative depiction of this conflict. Through powerful performances by both Harris and Rachel Roberts, as well as accomplished cinematography by Denys Coop, the film achieves a profound level of cinematic poeticism within its realist structure.

The new Criterion edition of This Sporting Life features a pristine transfer of the film, as well as several notable extras. Among these are two early documentary shorts by Anderson, Meet the Pioneers (1948) and Wakefield Express (1952). Although these shorts lack the artistic refinement of The Sporting Life and Anderson’s later work in feature film, they do remain of historical importance in illustrating the director’s early treatment of cinematic realism. Also of significance is Anderson’s final film, Is That All There Is? (1992), a revealing autobiographical examination of the director’s daily existence made during the final years of his life. These special features, as well as others such as the short documentary Lindsay Anderson: Lucky Man? (2004) and a 1963 essay by Anderson on the making of This Sporting Life, provide valuable insight into the artist’s motivations as a motion picture director, and justify the film’s reputation as an important cinematic achievement.

Contributor Details
Brian Wilson is a graduate student in Mass Communication and Media Arts at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale.