5 Best Football Movies Streaming On Netflix

When looking at the best sports movies of all time, American football doesn’t tend to get as much representation as baseball or basketball.  Even boxing encompasses a larger percentage of the most beloved sports movies than football. Whether because of the inherent danger of the sport that makes for a riskier production, or actors not wanting to spend half a movie hidden behind a helmet, many football movies tend to go unnoticed. And those that are made largely tend to go the comedy route.

That said, many football movies — and the ones that typically succeed creatively — are those based on true stories. If you’re going to tell a real story anyway, you might as well do a documentary. Four of the five best football movies on Netflix right now are documentaries, as that tends to be the most compelling way to tell the story of the sport, its history, and its important figures. The one that isn’t a documentary, unsurprisingly, is a dramatization of real people and events. 

• Director: Matthew Ogens
• Main subject: Amaree McKenstry-Hall 
• Rating: PG-13
• Runtime: 39 minutes
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 100%

Though true crime stories and celebrity biographies encompass many of the best documentaries on Netflix, the streaming service also has some great offerings in the sports arena. What tends to get the most attention are ongoing series, but a few standalone films also deserve some attention, such as 2021’s “Audible.”

The Oscar-nominated documentary short focuses on Amaree McKenstry-Hall, a senior at the Maryland School for the Deaf who plays on the institution’s football team as he deals with struggles both related to and separate from his disability. At a lean 39 minutes, “Audible” doesn’t meander like a lot of documentaries do and makes every moment matter. Sure, you want to see more of McKenstry-Hall; his friends and family; and the school itself by the time the credits roll — but there’s something to be said for a documentary with such a strong, singular focus that doesn’t try to be a sprawling biopic.

• Director: Ryan Duffy
• Main subject: Johnny Manziel
• Rating: TV-MA
• Runtime: 1 hr 10 min
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: N/A

Netflix’s “Untold” is a series of documentary films that focuses on athletes and other figures in the sports world. As of this writing, there have been six seasons of “Untold,” with each containing between three and five installments. People tend to gravitate towards those about more well-known subjects, including Caitlyn Jenner, Manti Te’o, Hope Solo, Tim Tebow, and Lamar Odom. But we chose “Untold: Johnny Football,” not only because it’s about football, but because it’s about a person who isn’t as much of a household name.

Johnny Manziel, aka Johnny Football, was a quarterback for the Texas A&M Aggies who seemed poised to be the next NFL all-star. But he didn’t handle the influx of money and fame as well as he could have, and became yet another cautionary tale that a pro sports career is never a guarantee no matter your talent and charisma. Manziel is refreshingly candid about his mistakes, and that’s what makes “Johnny Football” — and many of the “Untold” films — so compelling. 

• Directors: Ken Rodgers, Chris Weaver
• Main subject: John Elway
• Rating: TV-14
• Runtime: 1 hr 39 min
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: N/A

John Elway was one of those athletes who got so famous that he became a household name, even to people who never watched him on the field. Some of that was because of his many movies and TV cameos, as well as video games that bared his name, but his notoriety mostly stems from his talent and success across 16 years as a quarterback for the Denver Broncos. 

“Elway,” a Netflix original documentary, primarily focuses on that aspect of his career. But more casual observers might be surprised to learn that he was not only a success at college football but also spent time playing baseball for the New York Yankees. The film goes from those early years all the way to Elway’s time as the Broncos’s general manager, underpinned by fascinating stories of heartbreak and triumph from Elway himself.

• Director: Billy Corben
• Main subjects: The University of Miami football team
• Rating: TV-G
• Runtime: 1 hr 46 min
• Rotten Tomatoes: 79% (Popcornmeter)

Since its inception back in 2009, ESPN’s “30 for 30” documentary film series has been the gold standard for sports documentaries. The series proved so popular that it would go beyond encompassing only 30 films — coinciding with ESPN’s 30th anniversary, hence the title — and now consists of over 150 feature-length installments, plus another 100+ short films, podcast episodes, et al. 

Even so, “The U,” one of the original “30 for 30” entries, remains one of the best. Fortunately, it’s among the “30 for 30” episodes that has been slowly rolling out on Netflix. It tells the story of the struggling 1980s University of Miami football team and coach Howard Schnellenberger’s controversial idea to start recruiting Black players from impoverished areas. The result was a complete 180 for the success of the Hurricanes, but not without pushback from both longtime University of Miami fans and the NCAA itself. 

• Director: Phil Joanou
• Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Xzibit, Kevin Dunn
• Rating: PG-13
• Runtime: 2 hr 5 min
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 44%

Maybe documentaries aren’t your thing and you’d prefer a Hollywood dramatization of a real football story. We wanted to include at least one such example, and felt 2006’s “Gridiron Gang” serves that purpose well. But this isn’t strictly a token pick. A great choice for fans of “The Blind Side,” “Gridiron Gang” is a well-made, crowd-pleasing football biopic about a juvenile detention center that put together a team to compete against local high schools as a way of giving the young inmates a sense of purpose.

As it is neither one Dwayne Johnson’s best nor worst movies, “Gridiron Gang” is often overlooked when examining the actor’s filmography. But it’s certainly a much better Dwayne Johnson football movie than “The Game Plan.” The case can probably made that the Emmy-winning 1992 “Gridiron Gang” documentary, currently available to stream on Tubi, is better. But again, for those who prefer a slick Hollywood version of a story, Johnson’s “Gridiron Gang” scratches that itch well.