The Air Up There

Jimmy Dolan is a college basketball coach looking for a breakthrough that will earn him a promotion. His search for talent takes him from the United States to a remote part of Africa, where he hopes to recruit Saleh, a young man whose natural basketball ability Jimmy spotted in a home video. Saleh is the chief's son, however, and his people need him: a mining company covets their land, and the company fields a basketball team of its own. Jimmy's attempts to bring Saleh back with him run into the community's obligations and the looming dispute over the tribe's future.

The film was directed by Paul Michael Glaser, its third feature after The Running Man and The Cutting Edge, from a screenplay by Max Apple. Kevin Bacon plays Jimmy, with Charles Gitonga Maina as Saleh, alongside Yolanda Vazquez, Mabutho 'Kid' Sithole, Sean McCann and Dennis Patrick. It was produced by Ted Field, Robert W. Cort and Rosalie Swedlin for PolyGram Filmed Entertainment, Hollywood Pictures, Interscope Communications and Nomura Babcock & Brown.

Released in January 1994, the comedy runs 107 minutes and cost about 17 million dollars, going on to take roughly 21 million dollars worldwide. On IMDb it holds a rating of 5.6 from around 9,900 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 6.2 from a much smaller base of 172 votes, so the two audiences differ somewhat in how they received it.