Tomorrow, marks the DVD release of the movie 42 about Jackie Robinson breaking baseball’s color barrier and all of the issues that he faced as a result of that.
I have previously written about the movie and Jackie Robinson and will be adding the movie to my collection of baseball movies sometime this week.
The pending addition of another movie into my growing collection of films about baseball got me thinking about just how many films there are about baseball.
My baseball film collection is modest by most standards I would think but I am also highly particular about which movies get added to it. I am the same way about my collection of books about baseball believing firmly in the quality of quantity approach.
While I doubt that any one person could collect every single movie about baseball, nor do I think they should try, there are definitely movies that capture each element of the game and should be part of any collection of baseball movies.
Photo R. Anderson
Just taking into account the Kevin Costner Baseball trilogy one is exposed to the humor that comes from Bull Durham, the emotional Field of Dreams, and the tale of a pitcher holding on for one more perfect moment in For Love of the Game.
Personally I would love to see Kevin Costner take on another baseball role as a manager or some other area where a former player struggles with life once the fans stop cheering their name. But it appears that wish will need to wait as Costner seems content with playing the earthly dad to Superman.
So moving away from the Kevin Costner movies about baseball there are the films with a certain fantasy element to them. For these movies one can usually look at the Walt Disney vault for films like Angels in the Outfield.
Of course making a movie about a team that they owned was sheer marketing genius by the Mouse House. But, then again you don’t get to become as big as the Walt Disney Company without being good at business.
While I never really bought into the fantasy elements of Angels in the Outfield, there was one Disney baseball movie deemed worthy to join my collection and that movie was the Rookie.
