DIRECTOR
Sam
Raimi
SCREENWRITER
Dana
Stevens
based
on the novel by
Michael
Shaara
PRODUCERS
Armyan Bernstein
Amy Robinson
CINEMATOGRAPHER
John Bailey
MUSIC
Basil Poledouris
EDITORS
Eric L. Beason
Arthur Coburn
CAST
Kevin Costner (Billy Chapel)
Kelly Preston (Jane Aubrey)
John C. Reilly (Gus Sinski)
Jena Malone (Heather)
Brian Cox (Gary Wheeler)
J.K. Simmons (Frank Perry)
MPAA rating: PG-13
Running
time: 137m
U.S. release: September 17, 1999
Video availability: VHS - DVD
Official website
Other Sam
Raimi films
reviewed on this website:
- Army
of Darkness
- Darkman
- The
Gift
- A
Simple Plan
- Spider-Man
|
If
you haven't had your fill of movies in which everything hinges
on the Big Game, For Love of the Game might do it for
you. It's presumably meant as the concluding film in Kevin Costner's
baseball trilogy; as such, it's not terrible, but it lacks the
wit of Bull Durham and the resonance of Field of Dreams.
This movie, based on a short novel by the late Michael Shaara
(The Killer Angels), is about nothing less -- or more
-- than baseball as a metaphor for life: Even when it hurts,
you gotta stay in there pitching. We grasp that after five minutes,
but the movie goes on for another two hours and fifteen minutes.
Not that there aren't some stray good moments along the way.
Costner is Billy Chapel, a forty-year-old pitcher for the Detroit
Tigers. Billy is apparently the star of the team; he's the only
player anyone talks about, and his teammates -- especially his
devoted catcher Gus (John C. Reilly) -- seem in awe of him. He's
a living legend, and Costner plays him with becoming modesty.
His scenes with Kelly Preston, as a magazine writer he falls
for, and with the gifted Jena Malone as a teenage girl he sort
of takes under his wing, are casual and intimate. This is one
of his regular-guy performances, just the way his fans seem to
like him, and if he doesn't do anything fresh, he at least does
familiar things with finesse.
For Love of the Game has a ruminative flashback structure:
The conceit is that, as Billy plays what may be his final game,
he thinks back on his life -- mostly the recent past having to
do with the Preston character, Jane Aubrey. We keep flipping
back and forth, a technique that only works when the past illuminates
or comments on the present. Here, it just seems like a nostalgia
trip. We learn nothing much about Billy -- he is defined entirely
by his passion for the game and his greatness as a pitcher. Jane's
character is similarly sketchy; she exists to throw Billy a curveball
every now and then (that may or may not be a pun; she may actually
be intended as a symbolic pitcher throwing relationship fastballs
Billy can't hit).
When we're not watching the flashbacks -- which lose whatever
warmth and momentum they've been allowed to build whenever we're
taken out of them again -- we're watching the game, or, more
precisely, The Game. Every pitch, hit, bunt, foul, strike, and
slide into first base has the weight of Hercules' twelve labors.
Billy is driving himself to pitch the perfect game -- i.e., no
hitters taking a base -- and he's working against physical and
spiritual pain: His shoulder is killing him, Jane has just dumped
him, and he might get traded to the Giants. Given all this, you
can pretty much predict how Billy's trial on the mound will end,
and you'll be right.
For Love of the Game is painless, but it's also pompous
and pious about baseball in a way that doesn't mean much to a
non-fan like me. Also, I see that I've gotten almost to the end
of the review without mentioning the director, Sam Raimi. That's
because anyone could have directed it. Which is a shame, because
Raimi was once a terrific screwball horror-comedy director (the
Evil Dead movies, Darkman)
who has succumbed to a yearning for mainstream respect. Last
year he gave us A
Simple Plan, which I found bland and overrated; now he
gives us a sanctimonious baseball fable. If he keeps this up,
he'll be ready to shoot a Nora Ephron script. Sam Raimi may have
wanted to break into the big leagues, but I liked him better
when he was in a league of his own. He doesn't use the camera
as a fastball any more -- he doesn't throw us any curves. Maybe
he's forgotten how; maybe he no longer wants to. Whatever the
reason, even Raimi fans who enjoyed A Simple Plan may
look at For Love of the Game and sadly conclude that he's
lost his arm. Let's hope it's only a temporary Hollywood sprain. |
