MOVIE REVIEW - Moneyball

Great to see some star power back in theaters, and some adult movies. Here comes Brad Pitt and the new true story dramatic baseball movie, Moneyball.

This is the true story of Billy Beane, (Pitt) the General Manager of the Oakland Athletics baseball team in the early 2000's. Oakland is a small baseball market, and as the game is changing, small market teams must try to invent new ways to stay competitive and not have a 100 million payroll. Beane "buys" this Ivy League whiz kid from the Cleveland Indians with no baseball experience fresh out of college, and brings him to the A's. The A's have no money in a baseball sense.

They two of them set out with the idea they must find the "right'" players for them based on some mathematical formula they have devised. This flies in the face of 150 years of baseball tradition, and his new way is resisted at every turn by most members of the baseball world, and his own organization. Will his new way to build a team work as they enter the 2002 season? That's Moneyball.

Sports movies have gotten so much better over the past 20 years. They have finally figured out that any good movie has to have a story worth telling. And for sports movies, they must have a story that is interesting to all movie fans, and not have the arrow pointing squarely at sports. Secretariat, Miracle, and even the new Warrior are proof positive. Have a great story, and you have a shot at a great movie. Good movies are story first. Sports movies must be even more story forward. the story shines first, and sports is somewhere down the list.

Moneyball is great. Pitt was born to play this eccentric, risk taking character, that puts everything on the line for his possibly ill-thought out beliefs. They let you get to know Beane inside and out, and but there's still a part of him that remains hard to reach. Pitt is terrific, and so is the supporting cast of Jonah Hill (the whiz kid) and Phillip Seymour Hoffman who plays the skeptical team Manager Art Howe.

This is a wonderful mix of actual team footage from the 2002 season, and staged scenes. This movie is splendidly filmed, perfectly cast, and edited together in a way that it is thrilling and exciting, but not hokey or cheesy. It shows you the underbelly of baseball operations that go to the human level and exposes some parts I'm sure many involved are not thrilled you are seeing. But Moneyball takes the time to develop characters that are interesting, and flawed all at the same time. Skillfully done.

It's hard not to love Pitt here, as he looks as comfortable in this role as he has in any role in a very long time. This is a bit of a risk for Pitt, but you can tell he believed in the project, just as his character believed in the risky venture of 2002. Good to see Hill again making a great decision to make a grown up movie, and Hoffman, is better every time out.

Moneyball. This is a story worth telling, and it's good to see some risk taking in Hollywood for a change. This is off the beaten path, but this is very, very good. Moneyball is one of the years best movies so far, and look for Pitt to be mentioned in the year end honors.