With baseball season upon us, The Rookie made its way to theaters Friday. It’s a family film telling the true story of a teacher who finally achieves his dream of pitching in the major leagues at the age of 35.
Dennis Quaid plays Jim Morris, a high school chemistry teacher whose major league aspirations were originally ended due to a shoulder injury in the minors.
Morris coaches his high school’s baseball team in a town where football reigns. The team lacked motivation and lost every game at the beginning of the season.
With the hopes of instilling passion into his young players, Morris makes a bet that if the team wins district, he would try out for a major league organization again.
The team goes on to win and Morris must live up to his end of the bargain.
Even though Morris was significantly older than the rest of the players, Morris discovered that his once fading pitch has now turned into a 98 mph fastball.
The Tampa Bay Devils Rays expansion team is impressed and signs the pitcher to a minor league contract.
Within a short period, Morris is brought up to the big league and pitches his debut in front of his family and friends at the Ballpark in Arlington against the Texas Rangers. Morris goes on to pitch for two seasons in the majors before he retires due to another injury.
Relative to other recent sport films, The Rookie is not a superior film, but it’s solid and entertaining. Because of its G-rating, the movie is sweet-natured and geared toward the entire family.
The Rookie, however, is surprisingly slow-paced and runs over two hours. And being based on a true story, the plot line is almost predictable to a fault and, at times, is a little too cheesy.
The Rookie does contain a classic element of any good sports film – the need to root for the underdog.
The audience cheers for the high school baseball team in the beginning of the film and then for Morris as he proves himself against younger competitors. Because of this, it’s difficult not to like the movie and its characters.
Even with its long running time, a lot of detail is left out of the film that ultimately prevents it from achieving the level of Rudy or Remember The Titans.
Those movies were able to capture the human spirit without the plot holes in The Rookie.
For instance, the troubled relationship between Morris and his father is unclear as well as the effect that Morris’ first attempt at professional baseball had on his relationship with his wife.
While The Rookie is not a great film, it’s certainly worth the price of admission simply for the inspirational story.
Catering especially to all of the baseball fans, this one will definitely get you in the mood for Opening Day at the ballpark.
