A Critique of the Movie Champions: Breaking Down What Worked and What Didn't

I had seen a collection of disabled influencers and accounts I love promoting Woody Harrelson's latest film, Champions and was eager to see it, despite his problematic ableist anti-vaccine rhetoric on SNL. Champions is a coming-of-age story about a protagonist who gets himself into trouble due to his bad attitude, lack of professionalism and eventually driving under the influence. Harrelson’s character, Marcus, is sentenced to coach basketball for adults with developmental disabilities as a punishment for his actions. Woof. 

Despite an interesting opening narrative, the movie manages to tackle some sensitive topics and attempts to address some of the stigmas disabled people face each day. Let’s take a closer look at this movie and break down what it did right and wrong. 

Positives:

Casting Disabled People 

One of the most important points that Champions gets right is its casting. This movie stars actors who are actually disabled in real life, which is an incredibly important point that filmmakers often overlook when making movies about disability or any other topic related to marginalized groups. By giving disabled actors the chance to play characters with disabilities, this movie allows them to showcase their talent and represent themselves rather than relying on able-bodied actors for these roles. 

Addressing Stigmas Head On 

Champions also does an excellent job of addressing stigmas head on by showing how the protagonist has to confront his own biases as well as those of others around him. 

He learns quickly that having a disability doesn’t make his players less capable or valuable. He sees unique insights in how people with disabilities live, their relationships and unique interests. This kind of representation is so important in helping viewers understand the nuances of living with a disability and how it shapes one’s experience in society.  

Illustrating Implicit Bias 

The film also does a great job illustrating implicit bias—or the unconscious attitudes we have toward people based on our preconceived notions—by showing how even people who are well intentioned can harbor thoughts or beliefs that are rooted in prejudice or misinformation about disability. Between dealing with bosses that treat disabled people unfairly, judgment by non disabled people on public transportation or navigating “feel good” media exploitation that is far too common for our community, the film doesn’t shy away from showing how implicit bias directly impacts the life quality of disabled people. 

Negatives: 

Non-Disabled Saviorism / Inspiration Porn. 

One major failing of Champions is its reliance on the trope of “non-disabled saviorism”—the idea that someone without a disability must swoop in and “save” disabled people from their plight. While this might be good for dramatic effect, it sends the message that disabled people cannot save themselves without help from abled people, which reinforces ableist stereotypes and further marginalizes disabled individuals who already face numerous barriers every day just to access basic rights like education and employment opportunities.   

Champions has an interesting take on this trope, in that Marcus coaching the team “saves” them and they “save” him, which starts to go in the “inspiration porn” territory. “Inspiration Porn” is a term coined by the late disability activist Stella Young who describes the term as “anything that uses disabled people for self gratification of non disabled people.” Champions positioned the disabled characters as a stepping stone for self improvement of Marcus, rather than in a nuanced symbiotic relationship.

Missed Opportunities to Address Systemic Ableism  

The film also missed several opportunities to address systemic ableism—the discrimination against disabled people embedded into our laws, policies, institutions, values, norms, etc. The movie had an opportunity to clearly illustrate how systemic ableism continues to limit our ability to participate fully in society due largely because they don't have access to necessary resources such as healthcare, equitable employment and transportation.

Personally, I would have loved a deeper conversation about Benny and his employer and the narrative going in the direction of subminimum wage. This scene could have been moving and resulted in a funny, empowering scene of Benny taking agency and standing up for himself - both combatting nondisabled saviorism and illustrating viewers at the horrific, yet common, practice of paying disabled people less than minimum wage. 

Lack of Dimension in Disabled Characters

 Finally, while many characters in this movie are presented as “one dimensional” (which is true for many films), there was definitely room for more depth when it came to portraying disabled characters in particular since they are often seen as flat and unidimensional in our real world. 

I would have much preferred to see this story adapted to be from the point of view of one of the disabled characters. It would have given a truly unique vantage point that other films haven’t done before and would have created much more buzz. If the script had been adapted for Johnny’s perspective rather than Marcus’,  we could have seen, and therefore understood, the following:

Seen: Their team is in need of a coach and transportation, amongst many other resources

Understood: The frustrations that come with a lack of budget prioritizing recreational activities and transportation for disabled adults

Seen: The desires to live in a group community

Understood: How difficult it can be for disabled adults to voice their autonomy over the desires over their non disabled family and caretakers

Seen: The trauma, fear and unique dreams that Johnny has and hurdles he faces

Understood: Disabled people experience the same emotions and desires as non disabled people, and we need to build a more equitable world for all

Lack of disabled expertise behind the scenes

Champions worked with The Special Olympics and Best Buddies for consulting when it comes to disability inclusion best practices, and while both of these organizations do wonderful work their specialty is not in creating authentic narratives for disability representation. I often talk about the importance of working with the right consultants for the right work, and this seems to be a case of hiring the wrong people for the project. When venturing into the very nuanced and sensitive topics of showing disability lived experiences on the big screen, production teams should work with disabled people with lived experience and communications expertise. Organizations like Misfit Media or LaVant Consulting would have been able to identify the downfalls of this movie and been able to knock it out of the park.

 It also would have been incredible to see Champions to have hired more disabled people behind the scenes to make this project possible. Disabled people hold less than 1% of leadership roles in media, marketing and entertainment industries - but there are incredible disabled professionals such as director Ashley Eakin and stylist Stephanie Thomas who could have taken this film to new heights through deep understanding of the disability community. 

While Champions has its flaws, it still manages to get some things right when it comes to representing disabilities accurately on screen—especially when compared with other films within its genre. While there could definitely be improvements made (as hinted at above), overall this film still succeeds at telling an inclusive story about overcoming obstacles despite having a disability while raising awareness about some key issues surrounding disability rights today.