Moneyball (12A)

Alison Rowat's Review

Metro Goldwyn Mayer used to boast that it had “more stars than there are in heaven”. This week sees the release of more films carrying more stars than are usually seen in this spot. Once in a while it happens - a slot in the movie calendar when the skies clear of flying superheroes and airhead rom-coms to leave behind sleek and gratifying movies for grown-ups.

Though hard to choose a film of the week when the running order includes Terence Davies’s piercing romance, The Deep Blue Sea, and Michelle Williams on dreamy form as Marilyn Monroe, the prize goes to Moneyball, Bennett Miller’s cracking baseball drama about a little team that dared to dream big with the help of maths and chutzpah.

With a screenplay by Aaron “West Wing” Sorkin and straight-out-of-the-park performances, including Brad Pitt on his best form in years, Moneyball is a sporting drama so on the money Sir Alex Ferguson could have made it.

Based on a true story, it had a head start in that it started life as a book by Michael Lewis, author of Liar’s Poker and The Blind Side. Lewis has an impressive track record in turning dry subjects, from bond trading to theories of American football, into oases.

Here, with his book adapted by Sorkin and Steven Zallian (Schindler’s List, Gangs of New York), Moneyball does for baseball what The Social Network, also adapted by Sorkin, did for geeky kids with laptops. As with The Social Network, you don’t have to know much about the subject matter to enjoy the sheer drama of it all.

Brad Pitt plays Billy Beane, baseball player turned manager of Oakland Athletics, the Caley Thistle of the World Series. As the film opens, it’s the end of the season. Beane needs new players to replace the ones he’s about to see poached by the big teams, but the bank account is bare.

While trying to negotiate a player trade with a rival team, Beane meets Peter Brand (Jonah Hill), a Yale graduate with a new way of thinking about sporting success. Instead of spending millions on big-name players, Brand suggests using statistics to find value in the little guys. Build a team from the ground up, all the cogs working as one to form a game-winning machine. Maths, not gut instinct, will be king.

Hill and Pitt make the perfect screen odd couple. Not since Bob Hoskins stood next to Jessica Rabbit has there been more of a mismatch in looks. The pairing works though, because the characters spark off each other like flint and steel. The ambitious youngster versus the faded sporting superstar, the new beau versus the old romantic tired of having his heart broken.

Part of the joy in watching them work together is the sneaking thought that Hill, like his character, can’t quite believe he is acting mano-a-mano with Pitt. He’s like a big kid who has gone to see Santa only to find Princess Leia taking his place.

Beane and Brand team up against an even older-timer in Philip Seymour Hoffman’s coach, Art Howe. Seymour Hoffman and director Bennett Miller worked together on Capote. Although he is dealing with that familiar beast, the grizzled old bear who can’t be doing with fancy theories, Seymour Hoffman manages to wrestle some fresh twists from the character.

Besides Pitt, Hill and Seymour Hoffman, the film’s other star is the dialogue. When it comes to meticulously constructed conversations that sound like the most natural riffs, there is no-one to beat Sorkin. Accept no wannabe substitutes of the kind attempted in The Ides of March. That stuff is mere muzak to Sorkin’s verbal jazz.

Here, Sorkin and Zaillian provide something of a masterclass in the scene where Beane gathers his scouts together to explain the team’s new approach. Surrounded by actors and real scouts, Pitt leads a conversation that’s funny, savvy and believable. The smartest lines mingle with the silliest jokes, the verbal chaos of everyone talking at once coming good by the end.

Having said you don’t need to know baseball to get the story, there is a lot of sporting talk and occasionally it can seem like a foreign language film without the subtitles. Being a sports drama, Moneyball is also not without the kind of triumph and tragedy scenes you’ll find either comforting or cliched.

But, like The Social Network, this is a at heart a human drama with many layers. Whether it’s Beane trying to be a good dad to his 12-year-old daughter Casey (Kerris Dorsey), or a half-terrifying, half-terrified father figure to a team, there are plenty of engaging stories.

One of several perfect moments features Casey singing Beane a song she’s written. Its basic message: life’s a parade of ups and downs and the best way to deal with it is to simply “enjoy the show”. Enjoy this show.

Paul Greenwood's Review

Second probably only to boxing, baseball has provided fertile ground for film drama down the decades, and this true story of how California team The Oakland Athletics changed the game is the latest to tap into the sport’s inherent romance.

In 2001, the A’s lose badly to the New York Yankees, with the massive difference in their spending budgets exposing the gulf in quality. Worse is to come, as they’re also about to lose some of their best players and don’t have the finances to replace them.

The A’s general manager Billy Beane (Brad Pitt) is tasked with rebuilding the team, but he can’t even scrape together bargain basement swap deals and it seems like an impossible job. That’s until he happens across a young analyst, Peter (Jonah Hill) working for a rival team, who seems to have the inside track on how valuable players really are.

Using nothing but statistics, Peter reckons they can find players that other teams have overlooked, perhaps because they’re too old or have an injury and are undervalued as a result, meaning they can get them for a steal. Billy’s experienced scouts think he’s mad, but the statistics say these players will get the job done, though moulding them into a successful team is another matter.

That hardly seems like a hotbed of dramatic conflict, and indeed it is mostly just a bunch of guys trying to win a ball game. Yet it’s thoroughly and consistently engaging, thanks to the personalities, the actors playing them and the witty dialogue all serving to make the stakes tangible.

Credit screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (in conjunction with Steven Zaillian) for repeating the trick he pulled with The Social Network and turning a potentially dry subject into invigorating cinema. It delves into minutiae without blinding you with stats, and while some understanding of the basics of baseball would help, you don’t need to be an expert by any means.

An unusually normal role for Pitt sees him coming across really well, smart but never smug, not trying to be larger than life, and fitting in with the aesthetic of a movie that’s fresh and natural. Hill is also a revelation, leaving his schlubby comedy persona far behind, though Philip Seymour Hoffman is rather underused as the team coach.

Refreshingly free of the motivational speeches that often blight sports movies but still able to be stirring when the moment calls for it, this is light but not lightweight and hopefully it can be embraced as warmly in the UK as it has been in the States.