Review: Hustle (2022)

How much NBA basketball do you watch? Would you recognize Kyle Lowry and Matisse Thybulle in a scene watching an amateur workout from the sidelines of a gym? How long would it take you to realize that the film’s young star is actually Utah Jazz power forward Juancho Hernangómez? Could you pick out the coach at the practice scene in Spain as former Raptors-assistant and Spanish men’s national team coach Sergio Scariolo, or notice that the three players practicing include Juancho’s brother, Willy, and former beloved Raptors point guard José Calderón? If you could, then Hustle is made for you. It’s a by-the-numbers inspirational sports movie enhanced by the details of its portrait of life in professional basketball.

In a scene early on, Adam Sandler’s Philadelphia 76ers scout, Stanley Sugerman, tells Hernangómez’s Spanish streetballer, Bo Cruz, that it’s not enough to be talented, you have to be obsessed. That’s what makes you better than the other talented guys at the top of the basketball world. Obsession with basketball is also what allows Hustle to rise above the flotsam of most sports movies for both fans of and professionals in the game. Its attention to the details sets it apart.

At the same time, the film is just another underdog story. Sandler’s scout wants to become an assistant coach for the Sixers, but the impulsive new owner of the team, Vince Merrick (Ben Foster), values Stanley more as a talent scout. If he can find the missing piece for the roster, Vince tells Stanley he can get on the bench. So Stanley hits the road to find a diamond in the rough. He thinks he has found one in Bo Cruz, a Spanish streetballer hustling the courts of Majorca. Bo is unrefined and has a hard time keeping his cool, but he’s enormously talented. Vince doesn’t want him, but Stanley believes in him, so he leaves the Sixers, hitches his wagon to Bo, and banks everything on the hope that with some training and hard work, Bo might make the NBA Draft Combine and eventually, the NBA Draft.

As is the case with many underdog sports movies, Stanley’s fate is tied to Bo’s. Stanley was a talented player in the past whose career ended when he made some personal mistakes. He doesn’t want Bo to make the same mistakes. They both have daughters they love deeply. They both have everything on the line. Only together can they make their dreams come true. Need you ask whether those dreams do come true?

The ending is a foregone conclusion in Hustle, but it’s the process that matters. In basketball, as in all sports, process is key (although, in the case of the Sixers, you shouldn’t necessarily “Trust the process”). The end result matters, but the way a player gets there, through preparation, through technique, through determination, is more important as it’s what sets a player apart in a league where everyone is the best of the best. Hustle details the process of turning Bo from an unrefined streetballer into an NBA prospect, and Stanley from a scout into a coach.

Unlike many sports movies, it doesn’t skimp on the details. There are montages here and clichéd ones at that. For instance, being set primarily in Philadelphia, the film references Rocky throughout, especially during a montage of jogging sequences, where Stanley forces Bo to run up a hill and times him on a stopwatch while following in a car behind him. The idea of “getting over the hump” is a dogged sports cliche, in Rocky and now here, so of course director Jeremiah Zagar, writers Taylor Materne and Will Fetters, and producers Sandler and LeBron James rely on these kinds of metaphors to carry the story.

But there’s not just one montage here. There are countless. We watch Bo run up the hill time and again, getting faster each time, but we also watch him at an open practice, where he gets mentally dominated by hotshot prospect Kermit Wilts (played by former No. 1 pick and Minnesota Timberwolves shooting guard Anthony Edwards). We watch him hustle on street courts and practice against Spanish national team members. Most importantly, we watch him prepare for the NBA Draft Combine, which is one of the key showcases for the NBA Draft each June.

During his training, Stanley puts Bo through the paces to make sure he’s game ready. It’s in sequences like this one where Hustle shows it’s put in the work to make sure all the details matter. Not only is seemingly every side character, coach, or player played by a real basketball figure (Trae Young, Khris Middleton, Tobias Harris, Julius Erving, Dirk Nowitzki, Brad Stevens, Boban Marjanovic, Moritz Wagner, among others, including the aforementioned Lowry and Thybulle, appear over the runtime). But also every activity is calculated and based on real combine workouts and real game preparation performed by NBA athletes. We’re not just talking about jumping rope. We’re talking about detailed activities, like double dribbling up and down the court while throwing passes through a moving tire, or trying to hit a sequence of lights surrounding the player while maintaining a dribble and possession. We get scenes of these workouts over and over, charting Bo’s progress and Stanley’s coaching, until Bo’s ready for the combine.

How exciting do you find these sorts of drills? Have you ever wondered what goes into preparing for the NBA? Your answer to these questions will likely determine your engagement with Hustle. That and your appetite for more dramatic performances from Adam Sandler, the quintessential manchild comedian who is a very good dramatic actor whenever he wants to be (as in Punch-Drunk Love and Uncut Gems). Sandler is good here, nailing the world-weariness and regret of Stanley, as well as the entire shtick as basketball insider. It’s no secret Sandler is a huge basketball fan and pick-up legend, so his love of the game carries over to his performance. 

But love of the game is also a prerequisite for enjoying this kind of work. Unless you’re won over by every variation of the underdog sports flick, you need to love the details of basketball to be won over by Hustle’s, well, hustle. It’s a film about process, obsession, and preparation. Perhaps its most profound comment is an unintentional one, which is that every player who makes it to the NBA is an all-time, fairy tale success story. There are only 390 active NBA players at any one time. So making it into the NBA is a chance of one-in-20 million. So once you’ve seen one success story, you’ve seen them all. 

What’s the difference between the players who make it and those who don’t? The preparation. The obsession. The hustle. This film charts the hard work in between the big moments. It’s a movie about an NBA lifer made for lifelong fans.

7 out of 10

Hustle (2022, USA)

Directed by Jeremiah Zagar; written by Taylor Materne and Will Fetters; starring Adam Sandler, Queen Latifah, Ben Foster, Juancho Hernangómez, Robert Duvall, Jordan Hull, Heidi Gardner, María Botto, Ainhoa Pillet, Anthony Edwards, Kenny Smith.

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