Clip of Player Angrily Lifting and Throwing Referee Into a Hoop Is From a Film

The clip is from a film called 'Eighth Wonder of the World,' which was released in 1981.

Fact-Check: This video of two teams playing in a basketball match is from a Soviet film.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

A video of a basketball match is going viral on the internet with users claiming that it shows a match between France and Russia.

What about the video?: The two-minute and six seconds long clip shows a Russian player lifting and throwing the referee into the hoop in anger. This receives a thunderous response from the crowd.

An archive of the post can be found here.

The video is being widely shared on social media platforms. (More archives to similar posts can be found here, here, and here.) We also received queries about the viral clip on our tipline.

Several social media users have shared the clip.

What is the truth?: The video is actually from a Soviet film called 'Восьмое чудо света' (Translation: Eighth Wonder of the World), which was released in 1981.

What led us to the truth?: We divided the video into several keyframes using a Google Chrome extension, InVID, and performed a reverse image search on them.

• A search on Yandex led us to the name of the film, "Восьмое чудо света 1981."

• Taking this as a hint, we performed a keyword search on YouTube and found the full length of the film uploaded on a channel called 'Alice May' on 3 June 2017.

• At around the 33:36 mark of the film, one can see the viral clip playing.

• The player can be seen throwing the referee into the hoop in frustration, which receives a massive applause from the audience.

What about the film?: It was a comedy film that was released in 1981. The film's plot revolved around Soviet basketball players who participated in international competitions for the Hera Cup.

• The film was directed by Samson Samsonov and was written by Vladimir Kapitanovsky.

• It featured several famous actors, such as Liya Akhedzhakova and Tatyana Kravchenko.

Conclusion: It is clear that the viral clip is from a film released in 1981and not from a real incident.

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