So, what IS the worst golf movie ever made?

Last month, on a whim, I started on an online Twitter poll match-play tournament about golf movies, and to give it what I hoped would be a unique twist, I opted to make it a “Worst Golf Movie Ever Made” (WGMEM) poll.

With a little help from Twitter friends who supplied the names of some golf-related movies that I hadn’t heard of before, I put together a list of twenty films, from the earliest I found, the 1951 Ben Hogan bio-flick Follow The Sun, to 2022’s The Phantom of the Open, about a serial imposter (and non-golfer) named Maurice Flitcroft who tries to enter the British Open. For background and accountability, I watched the ones I hadn’t previously seen (when they were available for viewing) and set things in motion.

Composing a match-play breakdown, I opened with two matchups on the first day the much-loved Caddyshack versus its much-reviled sequel, Caddyshack II, and two biographical films about revered golfers of decades past, Bobby Jones: A Stroke of Genius and Follow The Sun. Turnout was okay in that first round, with 69 votes cast in the dueling-Caddyshacks poll, and 37 in the bio-flick matchup. Caddyshack II won in a rout, 64 to 5 (I want to talk to those five people who think that the original Caddyshack is worse than the execrable sequel), and Follow The Sun, which features a fine actor but obvious non-golfer, Glenn Ford, portraying Ben Hogan, the man with one of the most beautiful golf swings ever seen, prevailed over the Bobby Jones story 23 votes to 14.

After that first round it appeared that people lost interest. I get it, folks are busy, but totals of ten, twelve, and then seven votes in the remaining polls in the Round of 16 were frankly disappointing. I mean, I have a little over 2,100 Twitter followers, and out of all those people no more than a dozen could be bothered to take a second or two and click on a poll button? Sigh…

Voting in the Round of 8 was equally disappointing, with a total of six votes cast, and the Semifinal round pulled a two-vote tie in one poll and no votes in the other. Throwing up my hands in frustration I cancelled the final round and declared Caddyshack II, the film with the most votes as WGMEM the winner – despite the fact that it was knocked out in the Round of 8 (in a one-vote “sweep”.)

In the wake of my poll I started thinking about a couple of existential questions relating to golf movies: What is a golf movie? What makes a golf movie a good or bad golf movie (as opposed to a good or bad movie, period)? Digging deep into my memories of a college Film Studies class (fulfilling a Humanities requirement for this Engineering major), I pondered these questions.

As I pondered, I received a bit of feedback (via Twitter DMs) from one contributor, Golf.com correspondent and fellow Bay Area resident Josh Sens. In the 1990s, prior to his current golf-writing gig, Sens reviewed movies for the Oakland Tribune, and he had these thoughts to share about golf movies:

“I think most golf movies suck to the point of being unwatchable. Partly because golf is hard to dramatize and partly because the guys playing the role of pros rarely have believable swings—but maybe also because golfers are boring?”

Josh’s comment about actors with poor golf swings is valid, up to a point, but unless the disparity is obvious, and egregious, it has never been a major sticking point for me.

I have found that golfers can also be extremely picky regarding other details in golf-related movies. Five years ago I was involved in an online discussion about The Greatest Game Ever Played, a golf movie that I think works very well on many levels, but one commenter in the discussion, who was obviously a deep-dive aficionado of golf equipment of that era (the story takes place in 1913) complained that the golf clubs that the actors were using were from the wrong decade (I can’t remember if it was earlier or later), and that the anachronism ruined the film for him.

(I have spotted anachronisms in movies from time to time (the case of archival footage of a Korean-War-era jet crashing on the deck of an aircraft carrier in the 1976 film Midway comes to mind), but though noticeable (and/or laughable) I have never delved so deeply into “anorak” territory that a movie was “absolutely ruined” for me because of such a thing.)

Sports movies in general fall into one or the other of two categories – they are either very specifically about the sport/game itself or a particular athlete or team, or they are framing a story about a more abstract social concept within the context of sport.

Josh echoed some of my own thoughts about golf movies in further comments:

“I remember interviewing the director Ron Shelton about Tin Cup. When the topic of Caddyshack came up, he said, ‘It’s a funny movie but it’s not a golf movie. It’s a movie about social class.’ ”

I guess you could say the same about all sports movies, that the good ones aren’t so much about the sport but about something deeper/more complex.”

I decided to try and split my list of golf movies into those two general categories: movies strictly about golf and/or golfers, and movies that use golf as a vehicle for another story concept:

Movies about golf:

• Follow The Sun
• The Caddy
• Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius
• Dead Solid Perfect
• Tin Cup
• The Greatest Game Ever Played
• Tommy’s Honour
• The Phantom of The Open
• The Squeeze

Movies that use golf as a metaphor:

• Caddyshack – class distinction and snobbery
• A Gentleman’s Game – social climbing/status-seeking
• The Legend of Bagger Vance – golf as a vehicle for recovery from trauma
• Golf in The Kingdom – golf as a path to enlightenment
• Seven Days in Utopia – golf as a vehicle for personal growth

I then found that some of the movies on the list really belong in a third category: just plain crappy movies. The movies to which I assign that dubious honor are:

• Happy Gilmore
• Golfballs!
• Caddyshack II
• Who’s Your Caddy?

Not that some of the movies on the first two lists aren’t really, really bad—they are. Follow The Sun is painfully earnest, and stars an actor who appears to have never held a golf club in his life before being cast in the film; Golf in The Kingdom takes a book that I find to be a terrible load of New Age drivel and turns it into an even worse movie; Seven Days in Utopia (which I reviewed here) and The Squeeze* are equally bad, for different reasons and in different ways.

The final comments I received from Sens:

“Caddyshack is tolerable because it has some good improv sketches by some great comedians but it only ranks high on the list of golf movies because the competition is so weak. Tin Cup is probably the best I’ve seen but it’s only a good film by golf film standards.”

Caddyshack is so ingrained in popular golf culture that I would venture to say that it is not only the most often quoted golf movie ever made, but one of the most often quoted movies of all time—and probably the only golf-related movie to have a book† (two, actually…) written about the making of the movie.

It should come as no surprise that my ultimate choice for WGMEM comes from my off-the-cuff third list of golf-movie types. Caddyshack II condenses the light-hearted “snobs vs slobs” credo of its namesake original into a bitter brew of broadly offensive clichés. Looking at the other two categories, my selections are, from movies about golf – The Squeeze; and from the list of movies that use golf as a metaphor – Golf in The Kingdom.

It gives me no joy to make these selections—not because it is painful to have to pass judgement on movies that someone obviously thought it would be a good idea and a useful expenditure of time and talent to produce, but because they are so painful to watch. They are that bad.

On the other hand, I take pleasure in selecting my favorite films from the two main categories (and here you will see that I am more or less on the same page as Josh Sens – but not necessarily for the same reasons): Tin Cup, from the list of movies that are actually about golf; and Caddyshack, from the list of movies that use golf as a metaphor.

Tin Cup takes the honors in its category for its realistic but humorous examination of the angst and anxieties associated with the game of golf, plus its stellar cast (Kevin Costner, Rene Russo, Cheech Marin, and Don Johnson – not to mention dipping into the ranks of actual pro golfers of the time in supporting cameos; such names as Peter Jacobsen, Craig Stadler, Gary McCord, and even a baby-faced Phil Mickelson) and outstanding writing.

From the other list, movies that use golf as a metaphor, Caddyshack heads the list because of the great – dare I say iconic – comic turns by Saturday Night Live alums Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Brian Doyle-Murray (one of Bill’s older brothers, and a writer on the film), veteran standup comedian (but feature film newbie) Rodney Dangerfield, relative newcomer Michael O’Keefe in his third feature film, and veteran straight-man Ted Knight.

Golf movies, as a broadly but capriciously defined genre of film, are a very niche product, but within the short list of movies that comprise that body of work can be found a wide spectrum of styles and quality – and probably, something to please just about any golf fan.

------------------------------------------------------------------

* Of which I wrote in another review that went down with the Examiner.com ship: “Golfers who care more about a decent golf swing than plot, dialogue, and character development will probably like this movie just fine, but I’m afraid that its eventual place in the golf movie spectrum will, in the long run, find it occupying a spot closer to The Foursome than to Caddyshack or Tin Cup.”

† Caddyshack – The Making of a Hollywood Cinderella Story, by Entertainment Weekly movie critic Scott Nashawaty, is a fascinating deep dive into not only the making of the movie, but the Harvard Lampoon and Saturday Night Live roots of the filmmakers and cast.

Hogan’s Alley — Riviera Country Club and Bantam Ben

Ben Hogan was a man who left his mark on the history of golf in many ways and in many places. He “…brought the monster to its knees…” at the 1953 U.S. Open at Oakland Hills, where the penal rough and narrow fairways had Tour pros shaking their heads. That same year, in his one and only appearance in the Open Championship (known on this side of the Atlantic as the British Open), he tamed the windy linksland of Carnoustie, where the 6th hole is known as Hogan’s Alley for his bold play to a narrow stretch of the fairway between OB left and a pair of dangerous bunkers. This approach to the challenge of the daunting 567-yard hole allowed him to reach the green in two – driver, wood – while other competitors, including then-defending Open Champion, South African Bobby Locke, were hitting something like 4-iron, 3-iron and a pitch to get on in three.

Of all the golf courses, all over the world, which were analyzed, dissected and overcome by the genius of Ben Hogan over the years, the Riviera Country Club golf course is second only to Colonial Golf Club in his home town of Fort Worth, Texas in being deserving of the moniker “Hogan’s Alley”. Back-to-back victories in the Los Angeles Open in 1947 & 1948, plus the 1948 U.S. Open victory, put Hogan’s stamp on this George C. Thomas masterpiece for all time. From the elevated tee at the 503-yard par-five opening hole to the uphill run to the final green overlooked by the massive Spanish-style clubhouse, Riviera is a stern test of shot-making which rewards precision play. Players who bomb it long off the tee but lack accuracy will find their time on this storied course a death march as they scramble to carve recovery shots out of the vicious kikuyu grass rough.

Besides the ball-swallowing kikuyu, Riviera boasts meandering barrancas, stands of leafy eucalyptus trees, and a multitude of well-sited bunkers – many with overhanging edges that make a clean up-and-down a chancy endeavor. The most famous of Riviera’s bunkers is the pot bunker in the middle of the 6th green, a feature which turns an ordinary-enough 166-yard par-three into a strategic conundrum, especially when the flag is situated back-left. Clusters of ghostly pale sycamores, still leafless in midwinter when the PGA Tour comes to Riviera, are featured at the western end of the course, standing guard around the 15th green, all of the short par-three 16th, and the 17th tee. More stage dressing than obstacle, the sycamores cast long, eerie shadows across the fairways and greens in the slanting winter sunlight.

Hogan’s first victory at Riviera, in 1947, came at a point in his Tour career when he was hitting his stride, finding success on the Tour and acclaim in the press. An opening round of 70 started him off in good shape, in second place behind Marvin (Bud) Ward and Toney Penna, but it was the blistering 66 that he stitched on the place in Saturday’s round—tying the course record—that put the rest of the field in his wake. A pair of 1-over 72’s on the weekend were all it took to cinch the win, as he posted a final score of  280 that bested 2nd place finisher Penna by three strokes.

Hogan’s success in the 1947 season had come despite signs that his relentless practice regimen was taking a toll on his body, even at age 34, but as the 1948 season opened he appeared to have put his physical problems behind him. In those days, well before the modern season openers in the Hawaiian Islands, the return to sunny Southern California was a welcome start to a new year’s round of tournament play. In 1948 Riviera once more lay at Hogan’s feet. He played the tournament in four under-par rounds, 68-70-70-67, for a nine-under total score of 275, a record that wasn’t equaled until 1975, when Pat Fitzsimmons again posted a 275, and wasn’t bettered until Hale Irwin’s 272 in 1976. (Lower scores for the tournament had been posted in the interim, but not at Riviera. From 1954 through 1972 the tournament’s venue moved between four other L.A.-area courses.)

The tournament that tied the names Riviera and Hogan together once and for all, though, was the 1948 U.S. Open – only the third time that the national championship was played west of the Mississippi River, after the 1938 Open at Cherry Hills CC in Denver and the 1941 Open at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth, Texas, and the first time on a West Coast course. Despite the USGA’s penchant for toughening up a course in preparation for hosting the U. S. Open – increasing the height of the rough, narrowing and/or skewing the fairways, and rolling and shaving the greens to lightning speed – Riviera’s longtime pro Willie Hunter convinced USGA Executive Secretary Joe Dey that the planned 6-inch rough would be too severe given the course’s wiry kikuyu grass; the rough was cut to three inches – enough to snag a mis-played tee shot, but not overly punitive. The course was considered to be sufficiently challenging as it was to provide a championship test – Bobby Jones himself, after playing to a two-over 73 during a visit in 1931, said, “Fine course – but tell me, where do the members play?”

After his victory at Riviera in January, Hogan predicted in his syndicated newspaper column that the course would play six to eight strokes harder for the USGA Championship in June, but after a couple of practice rounds on the U. S. Open setup, he commented that the course was playing no harder than it had for the Los Angeles Open. He underscored his comments with an opening round 67 (which included a 31 on the front nine). Hogan’s Saturday round was not as scintillating; an afternoon tee time and increasing winds off the ocean (the western end of the course is a scant mile and a quarter from the beach) gave him a bit more trouble. He came in with a one-over 72 – and considered himself lucky to get it. At the end of Saturday play Hogan was one shot behind Sam Snead, who followed his Friday round of 69 with another for a two-day total of 168 – a new 36-hole U.S. Open scoring record.

Sunday’s two-round conclusion put Snead out of the running, however. His U. S. Open curse struck again, and putting woes dropped him down the leaderboard with a morning round of 72 and an afternoon 73, for a final score of 283 – only good enough for 5th place. Sunday at the ’48 Open belonged to Ben Hogan and Jimmy Demaret – a flamboyant dresser and bon vivant who was a good friend of Hogan’s off the course. The pair came into the final day two strokes apart, Demaret’s Saturday round of 70 not making up all the ground he had lost with a Friday round of 71 (against Hogan’s 67). After matching 68s in the morning, Hogan still led Demaret by two at the lunch break. Hogan’s morning round included a dramatic recovery on the par-3 6th hole, where he blasted out of the peculiar little pot bunker in the middle of the green and sank a must-have putt to save par.

Tournament pairings were not re-aligned for the final round in those days as they are now, when TV coverage dictates the need for dramatic finishes. Demaret went out 30 minutes ahead of Hogan in the afternoon, and looked poised to make a run at the title when he went four under for the six-hole stretch from #7 through #12. A lipped-out putt from four feet on the 13th seemed to take the wind out of Demaret’s sails, though, and he wasn’t able to press home in the stretch. The best he could do was a 3-under 69, which turned out to not be enough to overtake Hogan.

Hogan played the final round of the Open in the precise, focused manner for which he was justly famous. Unruffled by a 3-putt on the 17th green, he matched Demaret’s 69 to stay two strokes ahead for the tournament, setting a new U.S Open record of 276 – five strokes better than the previous record, Ralph Guldahl’s 281 at Oakland Hills in 1937 – in the process. The record would stand for 19 years, until Jack Nicklaus’ 275 at the 1967 U.S. Open at Baltusrol.

After his success in 1947 and 1948, Ben Hogan never stepped into the winner’s circle at Riviera again; in fact, his next outing there, in the 1949 Los Angeles Open, saw him come home in a rather dismal tie for 11th place. Still, his place in Riviera’s history was secured by two successive, successful years, and the posh hangout of the Hollywood elite will be forever associated with Bantam Ben.