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The movie, “The Odyssey,” has covered entertainment news as though Cerberus (Google it) were guarding the headlines. So it shouldn’t come as any surprise that a new event, the Greek Odyssey Running Festival, will debut in (duh) Greece this fall.
Hosted the weekend after the Athens Marathon, the Greek Odyssey offers runners a way to extend their time in Greece, combining two race distances with the country’s mythology, coastline and late autumn/fall climate.
The event organizer, Marathon Tours & Travel, is an international destination travel provider for runners and their supporters and is more than ready to welcome the interest. (Expect cheering family members and friends wearing togas from Party City and Sprit Halloween Store to line key parts of the course.)
But movies have long brought athletes to explore destinations — even years after the films have left theaters for the realm of streaming. And to this day, they continue to do so.
In 2022, for example, “A League of Their Own" celebrated 30 years since it premiered in theaters on July 1, 1992. And to recognize baseball’s highest-grossing movie, the city of Rockford, Illinois hosted a two-day festival to commemorate the milestone in honor of the Rockford Peaches.
The Peaches were a part of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League from 1943-54 and won four league titles; they were also the main focus of the movie, which featured a legendary cast that included Geena Davis, Tom Hanks, Madonna and Rosie O’Donnell.
Beyer Field in Rockford hosts a variety of sports events and for the celebration, it was Ground Zero of Memory Lane, having operated as the home of the Peaches for 12 seasons.
“Beyer Field is so important in the history of baseball,” said Kat Williams, president of the International Women’s Baseball Center. “It’s important to Rockford, but this is why we do what we do. It’s about preserving the history of girls and women and all aspects of the game.”
A group called the Friends of Beyer Stadium helped restore the original field and added historical markings and signs to the area.
Even better news: This year, the Rockford Peaches celebrate their 75th anniversary and special events are planned.
Fans can visit Rockford and follow the Rockford Peaches Fan Trail throughout the Rockford region. One stop on the trail is Midway Village Museum, with historical artifacts and even an original Rockford Peaches uniform.
But if you’re going to talk about baseball movies, it’s hard not to shift gears a little and talk about “Field of Dreams.” Located in Dyersville, Iowa, the site features the original iconic baseball diamond that backs up to a cornfield (visitors can run the bases, play catch and enjoy the ambience), the famous farmhouse, a retail shop for souvenirs and an adjacent professional-grade MLB ballpark that also hosts special Major League and youth events.
The area is emerging as a sports tourism destination as well, given its amenities. And oddly, its biggest attraction is (wait for it) the cornfield.
In the Field of Dreams movie, the ghosts of baseball players past (including “Shoeless Joe” Jackson) emerged from that very cornfield. And that makes it a hot photo opp.
“Our corn is the star of the Field of Dreams, planted and harvested according to what is best for the success of the crop,” according to the Dyersville Events’ website. “We cannot guarantee the presence of corn at the beginning or at the end of our season.”
But baseball isn’t the only game in town for those who want to see movie sites.
In Knightstown, Indiana stands the Hoosier Gym, site of many pivotal scenes in the 1986 basketball movie Hoosiers, starring Gene Hackman and Dennis Hopper.
According to Wikipedia, the gym was the home court of the movie's Hickory Huskers. The facility has retained the same appearance as when the movie was filmed in 1985 and it attracts 80,000 tourists to the town per year.
That fame saved the gym’s life when, in 1988, it faced possible demolition as the 112-year-old school next door, then serving as an elementary school, was replaced by a new school north of town. The old school became an apartment building.
And that was when the town played defense. Two groups, Historic Knightstown and Historic Landmarks of Indiana, stepped forward to help preserve the gym. Now it hosts 80 high school basketball games a year.
Additionally, each year the gym holds the Hoosiers Reunion All-Star Classic, where Indiana's best high school athletes play against each other, with the teams named "Hickory" and "Terhune," as in the movie.
Football tourists, however, tend to make tracks for two places. The first is Texas, where “Friday Night Lights” was situated.
Quick backstory: In 1990, author H.G. Bissinger published Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team and a Dream, a book chronicling the lives, struggles and triumphs of the 1988 Permian Panthers Football team as they chased the Texas State Championship.
The story captured the grit and passion of West Texas football, including schools in Odessa, Austin and Pflugerville.
The book’s success led to the 2004 movie Friday Night Lights — filmed in West Texas — and later to the beloved NBC television series. (Yes, Hollywood dramatized the story but the bottom line — community pride — remained the same.)
In Odessa, for example, the 18,000-seat Ratliff Stadium was the site of many of the games depicted. In Austin and Pflugerville, the Visit Austin Friday Night Lights Guide helps visitors find specific neighborhood spots, local diners, and fields used during the show's five-season run.
One more? How about “Rudy,” the 1993 heartstrings-tugging film about Daniel “Rudy” Ruettiger, who follows his dream to play football at the University of Notre Dame despite significant obstacles.
To this day, Notre Dame still celebrates the movie and in 2025, it was showcased in “flicks on the Field,” on the very place from which Rudy was carried off in triumph after his first, last and only game.
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