Year: 1989
Runtime: 107 min
Director: David S. Ward
Cast: Tom Berenger, Charlie Sheen, Corbin Bernsen, Wesley Snipes, Rene Russo, James Gammon, Dennis Haysbert, Margaret Whitton, Bob Uecker.
Nothing is more challenging to review than a feel-good sports comedy, except possibly any film starring Adam Sandler, though he’s a challenge for another time. The problem with sports movies is that everyone knows exactly how the plot will end, the underdogs win through improbable fashion, our heroes are lifted upon the shoulders of their fans. There is cheering. Probably kissing.
Unless it is a Serious documentary with Oscar potential, this is the standard, tried-and-true formula you can expect.
Is Major League any different? Nope. Not in the least. Expect scrappy underdogs, improbable victory against terrific odds, all the usual tropes.
But Major League succeeds because it has a ton of heart. It truly loves the sport of baseball, warts and all, and it has a cast that delivers their A game with the material provided.
The plot isn’t too complex. The struggling Cleveland Indians get a new owner in the form of the previous owner’s widow, who sets out to make a terrible team even worse. Her plan, you see, is to field a team so awful they can get out of their contract with the city and move to someplace sunny and warmer. To achieve these ends she selects a washed up manager from a minor league team (superbly played by James Gammon) and invites only the worst minor league players she can find to spring training. Heck, some of them are so bad they’re dead!
The rest of them? Well a more motley crew of misfits you’ve never seen. We have Charlie Sheen, playing the delinquent punk who has a fastball that could literally take your head off, Dennis Haysbert as the stoic Cuban who can knock ‘em out of the park all day so long as his voodo idol Jobu is feeling lucky, Wesley Snipes as the speedy base stealing dynamo (based on Ricky Henderson, though naturally toned down so audiences would believe him). And we have a few more less nutty specimens, like Corbin Bernsen’s successful short stop in the twilight of his career, and of course the ostensible star of the movie, Tom Berenger as the catcher with bad knees who jumps at this last chance to play in the majors.
It’s a talented cast, well rounded out by supporting turns from Margaret Whitton as the dastardly owner and real life ball player and commentator Bob Uecker who steals every scene he’s in as he calls the Indians games. I mean if they had just made a movie about Uecker and his hilarious commentary to the world’s worst baseball team I would have ate it up. His ad-libs tend to be the most quote worthy lines in the whole movie, especially his brilliant understatement regarding a wild pitch from Charlie Sheen that was “Juuust a little bit outside”.
Also good is the actual baseball. This just might be the holy grail at blending wacky comedy with realistic sport footage. This movie is a love letter to baseball as much as it is a stinging parody of the sport. And it holds up remarkably well today, even though the sport has shifted through a few changes.
Major League came out right before the Steroid Era dominated baseball, when starting pitchers might still finish a game or two, but it hardly feels like a relic. A lot of the jokes still land and all of the performances are still funny. I really can’t stress how James Gammon punctuates everything he says with a deadpan, gravel-tone delivery that will never cease to make me laugh.
What’s not funny is the hideous subplot that we are subjected to involving Tom Berenger’s character and his old flame played by Rene Russo. This terrible mini-story is carried on throughout the film, dragging down the otherwise stellar pace by interrupting the more interesting scenes to remind us that this crap is still going on. How bad is it? Honestly, it’s frigging sexual harassment of the worst order.
Berenger hasn’t spoken to Russo in years, but expects to come back into her life as if nothing had changed between them. And of course she’s engaged. To a lawyer. All she wants is a stable life, something he clearly cannot provide. But he does not take no for an answer and hounds her relentlessly until she eventually gives in, probably because she is afraid he might murder her.
And men wonder why women are afraid to say no! It’s a tragic waste of Russo’s acting ability and it denigrates the otherwise respectable character portrayed by Berenger by turning him into a predator. And it’s not as though the movie was completely free of problematic portrayals of women, thanks to their efforts turning Whitton into the villain, but this just climbs out onto that deformed, sexist limb, and proudly flaunts its achievements for the audience to see like a naked drunken frat boy.
It’s a jarring and gross bit of 80s stupidity that has no place in this otherwise fun movie.
But if you can ignore that nasty little diversion, possibly with the help of fast-forwarding, the rest of the movie is a blast.
Most of it is about how these failures and rejects come together to get us to the happy ending we want. Sure, the movie claims it’s because they band up to show that mean ol’ boss lady that they can be winners, but really it’s the male bonding experience that allows their improbable victories. Each character comes to better understand their teammates, even as outside strife seeks to tear them apart.
The very Christian pitcher comes to appreciate the differing beliefs of the foreign man, an extra-marital affair is put aside because the team needs the win not the drama, and even the mighty athlete’s ego will shrink to allow a teammate the winning run. It’s really well done and makes you understand just why some people can see baseball as an almost magical sport.
Frankly, this is the single most enjoyable baseball movie I have ever seen. The on-field action is cleverly disguised so that we could believe these actors playing against the pros and every highlight feels like it came straight from an actual game. If you like baseball, you will love this movie, full-stop.
And even if you don’t love baseball, there is a lot to like about this movie. The jokes are accessible even from a non-sports fan POV, the pacing is generally solid, and the actors charming as they mug for the camera.
The only foul balls in the entire production are the aforementioned sexism that borders on unwatchable, and a few other artifacts of ugliness, like the insistence on portraying Dennis Haysbert’s character as vaguely primitive, when he’s really just Cuban. But I think most of these flaws can be pushed through because the majority of the film is just so darned good.
It’s almost good enough to go a whole season in the majors.
