The director and producer of the new LeBron James documentary More than a Game discuss their labor of love.

GIANT: How did your involvement in More Than a Game come about?
Kristopher Belman: I started working on it about eight years ago. I was a junior at LA’s Loyola Marymount college, but I’m from Akron originally so I wanted to make a film about my hometown. At that point, LeBron and those guys were making some noise on the high school basketball level so I thought it would be a good way to kill two birds with one stone: I’d make something positive about my hometown and also silence some of the jokes about Ohio I was hearing in school. So I approached the school with the idea of making a 10-minute short film and they let me attend one practice. I went to that one practice and then happened to show up the next day and nobody said anything. So I turned that one practice into the next eight years of my life. At some point, I knew I needed to figure out a way to bring in the professional finishing touches and that’s when I ended up meeting with Harvey.

Harvey Mason Jr.: I was introduced to Kris by my babysitter, who was a friend of his. I met him and was blown away by the three-minute trailer he showed me. I knew there was a great story there. Since I wasn’t a film producer, I initially tried to introduce him to a few people I knew in the industry. But no one really seemed to really get the message of the movie, so after four months of meetings, we decided to do it ourselves.

GIANT: Was LeBron involved with the project already at that point or did you have to secure his permission during production?
Mason Jr.: We made the movie and when we got to a place where we were confident about it, we approached LeBron. We wanted him to be involved in the marketing, so I wanted to make sure he was happy with it. We brought him on a little more than a year ago when the movie was 65% complete and he was involved from that point forward.

GIANT: I noticed that he has an executive producer credit on the film. Did he have any say in the editing process?
Belman: None of the players saw a finished version of the movie until the Toronto premiere. His credit was more about support than anything. Once he saw what I was doing and felt I could do it on a professional level, he was like “What can we do to make this the best film possible?”

GIANT: Kris, was it a little weird to be an independent filmmaker struggling to pay the bills while the subject of your first film was making millions of dollars in the NBA?
Belman: It was definitely interesting. My graduation from college was definitely one of the lowest points in the process of making the film, because once LeBron entered the NBA, it became a different situation getting in touch with him. Meanwhile, I’m working at a coffee shop and the student loans are kicking in and I don’t have camera equipment for free anymore. I was looking for financial support and everyone’s offer would be “Let’s write you a check for six figures to buy the footage off you.” That was something I never entertained, but it did get a little depressing to be working at a coffee shop and someone is offering you a lot of money–just not for the right reasons. I remember thinking, “This is never going to happen, I’m never going to get this done the way it needs to be done.” But I felt this story had to be told no matter what.

GIANT: What was your working relationship like? Were there any times that you butted heads over the content of the film?
Mason Jr.: I don’t remember us ever having a disagreement. Kris was the driving force in the editing room, while I made sure the special effects and marketing stuff was happening. But we definitely had a good partnership; if he liked something, I said “Let’s try it” and if I liked something he said “Let’s try it.” There was never a point where we took anything personally and it became “Don’t do this” or “Don’t do that.” We were both ready to try anything and more often than not, the right choice won out.

GIANT: What were some of the documentaries that influenced you?  Hoop Dreams had to be in the mix right?
Belman: The ones that spoke to me the most where those that followed multiple characters, so films like Murderball, Spellbound and Go Tigers.  Hoop Dreams was always on my radar because I love it–it’s one of my top ten films of all time.  I can’t say it directly influenced the style of More Than a Game, but it was inspirational in that it took two characters no one had ever heard of and made them compelling for two hours.  So every time that someone would tell me, “You should just focus on LeBron, because no one cares about Coach Dru Joyce,” I’d just think about Hoop Dreams and how brave the filmmakers were to explore these lesser-known characters.

GIANT: Is there a reason that the film doesn’t address the “student” part of being a student athlete?
Belman: There were a lot of different elements I tried to tackle.  I interviewed teachers and fellow students, but during the editing process we realized that while these themes were interesting and served one purpose, they were disrupting the flow of the narrative.  The film explores six main characters and that’s a lot of people to support and develop.  So to keep the flow, we decided to pull out those themes.  Also, they were really good students, so there wasn’t a lot of conflict with the scholastic aspect of things.  LeBron graduated with a 3.5 GPA and all the other guys were right there behind him or ahead.

GIANT: While LeBron has enjoyed tremendous success, none of his high-school pals have made the leap to the NBA.  Is there really no ill-will between them as the film would have us believe?
Mason Jr.: All these guys know they’re not LeBron and that he’s a very special athlete.  By the same token, they’re all still best friends.  They all still hang out together and LeBron is very generous with them.  He doesn’t elevate himself above the rest of them; he does everything he can to make sure they’re on the same level.

GIANT: What do you hope that moviegoers take away from More Than a Game?
Mason Jr.: I hope they get a good feeling at the bottom of their stomach and that they leave the theaters feeling that anything is possible.  It takes hard work and dedication and loyalty, but you can do great things.

More Than a Game opens in limited release on Friday and expands to more theaters in mid-October.