MONEYBALL movie review

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Moneyball (2011) — ***1/2

Moneyball isn’t your average sports film mostly because it can’t be. It is, after all, a film about two men who upend the traditional means for developing a baseball roster. The film daringly balances the usual sports film cliches with moments of existential drama. It focuses on management level problems but never forgets the players on the field. It’s cynical and romantic all at once. I can’t say I’ve ever seen a sports film quite like it. Any Given Sunday comes closest, but even Oliver Stone’s behind-the-scenes look at football fails to provide an emotional struggle like that of Billy Beane’s.

Beane (Brad Pitt), a former top draft pick who failed to live up to the hype, is the general manager of the Oakland Athletics. After losing the major players from his 2001 playoff team to ball clubs with deeper pockets, Beane has to rebuild his roster with an operating budget of $40 million, much less than the more than $140 million of other teams. Frustrated by an owner who won’t open his wallet and scouts who treat the game like a the same old fair fight for players, Beane is looking for a change. And he gets it in the form of a Yale economics grad name Peter Brand (Jonah Hill).

Brand works for the Indians and prevents a player from being traded to the A’s for an unknown reason. When Beane confronts him, Brand explains a new method for building a team. It’s analytical instead of emotional. It’s data-driven instead of instinct-driven. It’s completely different from anything other baseball teams are doing. So Beane takes a chance.

Beane might be desperate enough to make big changes to building his roster, but they are big changes. They fly in the face of everything that fans, sports writers, and scouts know about the game. That’s why it makes sense that Aaron Sorkin (with a rewrite from Steven Zaillian) took on the screenplay. Sorkin, who has a habit of writing behind-the-scenes stories about change-makers and idealists, turns what could have been statistical babble into a witty screenplay. Serious fans of the game will still likely take more away from this movie than your average audience member, but Sorkin helps the film break out of the sports genre.

Like his The Social Network screenplay, there drama is darker here than what we’re used to from Sorkin. Director Bennett Miller, however, goes for understated rather than aloof (as Fincher did). Even during the film’s most triumphant moments, like the lead up to the Athletics winning 20 games in a row, you aren’t cheering for the major league equivalent of the Bad News Bears. Instead, you’re held in suspense, hoping that Beane can prove that this formula is the right one.

Moneyball is Beane’s film, after all. As Beane, Brad Pitt captures the conflict of a man who lives to see his team win, but struggles with letting that passion become emotion. He lets it seep in slowly, as Beane forms relationships with the players that he wouldn’t have formed before. He allows himself to get excited, very excited, when the plan starts to work out. Yet, the jaded former player and manager of a small market ball club has a hard time being sentimental about a sport where money rules.

It’s Peter Brand, whose strictly analytical approach wouldn’t appear to leave room for emotion, who confronts Beane on this. And in those moments where Brand’s outlook comes into play, Jonah Hill shines. Hill, who is best known for roles in outrageous Apatow comedies, is placed alongside megastar Pitt and acting powerhouse Philip Seymour Hoffman (as the A’s manager), and keeps up with them. He doesn’t seem restrained by the understated tone of the character, at ease with the moments that need quiet contemplation and ready for those that need him to perform. On paper, Hill and Pitt as the lead actors doesn’t sound right, but as it turns out, the two are a surprising match.

Even in the moments when Moneyball drags, the team of Pitt, Hill, Bennett, Sorkin, and Zaillian wins. I didn’t necessarily feel that way when I left the movie theater, though. I honestly wasn’t planning on writing a review this glowing. But as it happens, Moneyball has stayed with me more than I expected it to. Bennett’s Capote had the same slow burn effect. Here Bennett again doesn’t just tell a character’s story, but also lets it permeate every element of the picture. I’ve watched Capote a half dozen times. Chances are I’m going to do the same with Moneyball.