CIFF Review: Sugar
Sugar (2009)–****
Sugar says a lot about America’s pastime, but this drama following a rising Dominican baseball star says a lot more about the world outside of the game. Many people would say that’s true of other sports films, that there’s a grand lesson in defying the odds and being all that you can be. Yet, there’s something truly inspiring when a player, in this case Miguel “Sugar” Santos, just does it his own way.
Early in the film, a coach tells Sugar (Algenis Perez Soto) and the other aspiring players to think only of themselves. Forget family. Forget friends. That’s how you make it to the big leagues. The numbers are against any of the Dominican players. Still they practice daily with the MLB team that signed them before they were out of high school. And Sugar, a pitcher, has a hot arm, one that he knows will take him to Yankee Stadium one day.
When Sugar is called to the States for spring training with the Kansas City Knights, he finds that the competition is a little steeper. Another Dominican player named Jorge (Rayniel Rufino) tells him it’s just like playing back home, and Sugar perseveres, making through to the minors.
The surroundings are a little more foreign in Iowa where he plays for the Bridgetown Swing. Next to no one speaks Spanish. Eventually his pal Jorge, who also made it to the Swing, gets sent back home. But Jorge flees to New York City instead, a plan Sugar keeps in mind when things look like they won’t work out.
By now you probably already know how Sugar is going to end. But let me reassure you. It’s a happy, life-affirming conclusion. Writer-directors Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden, the team behind Half Nelson, deliver another stunning film, one that’s realistic yet hopeful, serene yet bursting with life.
The film is beautifully shot, not nearly as gritty as the previous Fleck/Boden production. It makes playful nods at other sports films while creating exciting, if subtle, visual poetry when we need to see the world from Sugar’s perspective.
Subtle is also a good word for Soto’s performance as Sugar. Soto, who grew up in the Dominican Republic and had Sugar’s big league dreams, adds another layer of realism to the film with his shaky-legged screen debut. He’s willing to let the camera do it’s work as he grows inside his character. There’s a gentle drive and a developing sense of purpose that Soto harnesses here. He not only makes you root for Sugar but also wish you saw more characters like him.
Even if there aren’t many comparable characters out there, and in today’s cinematic landscape there aren’t, this film reminds you that there are more people like Sugar in a world outside of the cinema. His journey from Arizona to Iowa to New York provides a panoramic view of America, while his story makes us rethink our ways of dreaming. Hopeful realism or realistic hope. Either way you look at it, Sugar, a film that debuted at Sundance last year and is finally getting its day, is a movie that defines our time.
Sugar, directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck and starring Algenis Perez Soto, was screened at the 33rd Cleveland International Film Festival. The film opens April 3 in NY and LA. More at www.sonyclassics.com/sugar.
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