BOYS AND BALLS

Director Sue Thomson / 1994 / Australia

Red ones, white ones, yellow ones, orange ones, large ones, small ones, some that aren't even round - boys will play with balls. Sue Thomson set out to find out why and the result of her investigation is Boys And Balls. Led by the typically obtuse commentary of sports gurus H.G. Nelson and Roy Slaven and featuring interviews with a range of famous ball handlers as well as a number of not so obvious boys, blokes and men, this is a very witty and highly irreverent pop-documentary about the male obsession with ball games.

This is a film in which the opinion of the kid next door is given equal value as that of a test cricket legend; where the stature of pro-ball sports is taken down from its pedestal by the commentary of a group of thirty-something backyard enthusiasts; where sports fanatics are discovered lurking beneath unexpected faces.

Are ball games modern equivalents of male tribal warfare? Is it all just a male bonding exercise? Will boys ever grow out of their adolescent fantasies of sporting stardom? There seems little hope, if Boys And Balls is on the mark.

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