I am a huge baseball fan. I’m originally from Lowell, Massachusetts, As a kid I grew up watching the Boston Red Sox. I have been through my up and downs with the Sox and I has made me a better person for going through all these good and bad times with my team. As I am also a film critic I am a huge sports movie fan as well. Some of the best sports movies over the last 80 or so years have been baseball movies. Baseball is such a broad topic though. There have been plenty of pro baseball movies such as Pride of the Yankees, Moneyball, The Rookie, Fear Strikes Out, Cobb,Eight Men Out and Fever Pitch. There has also been a fare share of kids baseball movies. Bad News Bears and The Sandlot come to mind. Fictionalized telling of baseball stories are very prevalent though. The Natural, Bang the Drum Slowly, Major League,Field of Dreams are a few of those. Field of Dreams is one of three baseball films Kevin Costner has starring in with the other two being Bull Durham and For Love of the Game. There even has been a baseball movie about the females baseball league of the 50’s. Actors of all caliber have starred in baseball movies. Gary Cooper comes to mind as the best performance by anybody in a baseball movie as Lou Gherig the dying baseball legend in Pride of the Yankees. Brad Pitt and Robert Redford give great performances though as The GM of the struggling and cash strapped Oakland A’s and Roy Hobbs a phenom of a baseball hitter. Some baseball movies are comedies but, most baseball films are dramas. Every year we get a baseball film or two and this year is no different. Next month May 16th is the opening of 1000,000 Dollar Arm starring Jon Hamm. I look forward to more baseball films and I keep enjoying the one that have come out in theaters in the past.
Dan Skip Allen
From the Fourth Row! 