Arthur Agee after a big Marshall win in the state high school finals

''Do you all wonder sometimes how I am living?'' Arthur's mother, Sheila, asks the filmmakers at one point, turning directly to the camera. ''How my children survive, and how they're living? It's enough to really make people want to go out there and just lash out and hurt somebody.'' Yes, we've wondered. Her family is living on $268 a month in public aid; when Arthur turned 18, his $100 payment was cut off, although he was still in high school. Their gas and electricity had been turned off in the winter. The family was using a camp lantern for light.

During the course of the film Sheila's husband leaves and gets into trouble, she suffers chronic back pain, she loses a job and goes on welfare, Arthur can't meet the tuition and is dropped by St. Joseph's, the suburban high school that recruited him. After the school actually refuses him a copy of his transcript for not paying bills his family wouldn't have if St. Joseph's hadn't foraged in his neighborhood for a winning team, he transfers to the public Marshall High School, and leads them to the state finals. Take that, St.Joe's.

Then, in the film's most astonishing revelation, we see Sheila graduating as a nurse's assistant, with the top grades in her class. We didn't even know she was taking classes. Gene Siskel told me, "Arthur and William are applauded by hundreds or thousands of sports fans. When you see that nurses' graduation day ceremony, most of the folding chairs are empty. She's the one who deserves the standing ovation."

William Gates playing for Marquette

Gene and I saw the film early. We were approached by a friend of ours, the Chicago publicist John Iltis, who didn't ask us to see a screening, he told us this was a film we had to see. We believed him. We were the only people at the first screening outside Kartemquin. Iltis rented the original auditorium of the Film Center of the School of the Art Institute -- which has become, fittingly, the new Siskel Center. When the movie was over we remained in our seats for a minute or two before speaking. Neither one of us had ever seen anything like it. It didn't have distribution. It had been accepted at Sundance. We decided to break the rules and review it before Sundance, hoping that more people would see it. It won the Audience Award,