Documentary | 1h 27m | Sports | Oct. 29, 2024
Like Penny Marshall’s delightful “A League of their Own” before it, “The Herricanes” is about an all-women’s sport team. But instead of a feature film comedy about the historical American women’s professional baseball league, it’s a documentary about the beginnings of the all-female full-tackle football league in the U.S. in the 1970s.
Then, there’s the mixed martial arts world of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). I didn’t want to see women in there either—no siree Bob, no way. Now, I’d rather watch the women fight than the men. Why? The ladies don’t have the titanic egos, they don’t talk smack, play politics, duck fights, and they bring their A-game every time. They have zero preening vanity (whereas quite a few of the men wallow in it), love what they do, and have tons of heart. They’re true warriors.
Expect a feature film treatment about The Herricanes to come along soon, because “The Herricanes,” featuring archival game footage and feel-good nostalgia, is a story that needs hearing.
Sports Are Ultimately Not About Gender
Sports aren’t about gender unless they involve transgender people; that is, men identifying as women. These men want to compete with biological women, which is unfair and unsafe. But what ultimately made me change my mind about women in football (coming from a football family, as I do) was having something I already knew, deep down, re-clarified for me: Regardless of gender, football players are a tribe.
I was recently watching “Sprint” on Netflix, which is a documentary series about the behind-the-scenes preparation of U.S. and Jamaican Olympic sprinters. When an interviewer asked American gold-medalist-hopeful Fred Kerley, if his previous football career was possibly where his heart really resided, he admitted, “Yeah football is my thing. I like to hit people.”
But consider this: At one point, a female interviewee reveals she’s a three-time suicide survivor, and five-time rape survivor, and says that football literally saved her life. You can in no way, shape, or form argue with that.
Southern Division
America’s female football’s Southern division included the Houston Herricanes, the Oklahoma City Dolls, Dallas Ft. Worth Shamrocks, Dallas Bluebonnets, Tulsa Babes, San Antonio Flames, Lawton Tornadoes, Columbus Pacesetters, and Toledo Troopers. Turns out, the Toledo Troopers are the winningest football team in history, men or women’s.The Houston Herricanes never became a household name, but these ladies put an all-female league on the map—a gutsy move all those decades ago—purely out of a sincere love of the game. Some interviewees tell similar stories of how much they loved sports growing up but that it was frowned upon as being unladylike.
I can’t find the exact quote, but I feel like I read an interview where Jack Nicholson observed, “Women don’t play by men’s rules.” According to Sean Penn, Jack said, “Women are smarter than men—they don’t play fair.” That actually sounds more like something Jack would say. But whatever. My point is, when the Herricanes’s first male coach tried the time-honored men-and-boys method of intimidation via face-mask grabbing, neck-twisting, and hollering in a player’s face, the women were not having any of that. As one Herricanes player put it, “You will not be grabbing any grown woman’s face mask.”
Different Methods, Same Goal
This is really what it’s all about—they had to figure out their own approach. I was reminded of how, upon observing the overwhelmingly positive impact the modern boyhood-to-manhood rite of passage had on their husbands and boyfriends—women desperately wanted some of that action, too.But after a weekend of copying the men’s New Warrior weekend (The “New Warrior Training Adventure” is currently provided by The Mankind Project) action-for-action and word-for-word—sleeping in the woods, rolling in the dirt, eating cold granola for 3 straight days, taking freezing showers, packing into stifling sweat lodges, learning authenticity, integrity, and accountability, hollering and howling and beating drums and exorcising demons—the women discovered they were absolutely miserable.
All Walks of Life
The team’s history is examined: The original team included a doctor, a banker, an exotic dancer—women who did all kinds of different things. They all came together to share the same love of football.Early on, the Herricanes had to figure out how to bounce back from an excruciating 56-0 blowout game, compliments of a rival team, the Oklahoma City Dolls. During their first season, the Herricanes chalked up a record of exactly zero wins. However, nothing was going to stop them.
Title IX
Eventually we arrive at discussions about the importance of Title IX (a landmark Civil Rights law in the United States that was enacted as part of the Education Amendments of 1972) and the state of women’s sports today. Especially, the continuing fight against the people who don’t want to see the game of football (among other sports) change, or evolve, which includes women being allowed to play.Women’s tackle football is big in Europe and Scandinavia, but in the American South, especially in Texas, where football is widely known (half-jokingly) to basically be another form of religion, football staunchly remains an all-male world. There would seem to still be a long road ahead in terms of women gaining equal opportunities and respect.
Director Olivia Kuan’s “The Herricanes” is timely, interesting, the subjects delightful, and the film is educational and also entertaining. Tackling a topic that’s unknown to most, Kuan creates an instant connection with her subjects. The former players are charismatic, with expansive personalities, and it’s a pleasure to listen to these groundbreaking women tell their stories. Can’t wait for the feature film.
