Huluing "Hoop Dreams."

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 | 10:33 AM

"Hoop Dreams," Steve James' mighty, influential 1994 documentary following two inner-city Chicago teenagers over five years in frantic pursuit of the dream of becoming professional basketball players, is up on Hulu for free (with "limited commercial interruption" from sponsors) here.

Hulu CEO Jason Kilar writes on the site's blog:

In January 1997, I was walking curbside at Boston's Logan Airport. Waiting patiently in a line in the freezing temperatures was a guy named Steve James, the director of the documentary film Hoop Dreams. Steve was standing there by himself, minding his own business. I recognized him because he had just given a speech to a packed auditorium at a local university. I attended the speech, pressed up against the back wall due to the incredible response Hoop Dreams was getting in theaters at the time. When I saw him standing there on the curb, I walked up to him like a little kid and blurted out, "Hi. You made the best documentary I've ever seen in my life."

Matt Dentler adds that "Hoop Dreams has been largely unavailable to mass audiences for a while (not many basketball fans are gonna buy a Criterion Collection set), so to bring it to anyone with an Internet connection (for free!) is a great pleasure." And it's certainly awesome, though the doc's hefty, almost three-hour runtime is going to prove a challenge to most people's tolerance for watching streaming videos online.

[Photo: "Hoop Dreams," Fine Line Features, 1994]

+ Hoop Dreams (Hulu)
+ Hoop Dreams: I've Been Waiting to Write This Blog Entry for Some Time (Hulu Blog)
+ 'Hoop Dreams' on Hulu (Matt Dentler's Blog)