A Brilliant Conflict

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

This is ultimately a movie about the very bad things that can happen when we don't address our unease, when we just try to brush it off, whether that's to fit in or to preserve our self-image.

I was always surprised this film did so well at the box office. If you are a baseball fan it is almost unwatchable. I like Tom Hanks but he mostly snarls and growls in the film. Madonna is a complete anachronism and painful to watch. Most of the other women are simply irritating. Only Genna Davis is worth watching. Completely fails to capture the spirit of the wartime America. Don't waste your time with this turkey of a film.

Yes, there really was an All-American Girls Professional Baseball League; it existed from 1943 through 1954, and the Rockford Peaches won four championships over the course of the twelve year run, though not until the third season. Their main opponents in this picture, the Racine Belles, actually beat them to the punch by winning the league title during the very first 1943 season. Kind of makes me wonder why the film makers didn't reverse the teams for the movie, but the Rockford Peaches does sound like a more colorful name.Though the film is a fictionalized version of the women's professional baseball league, it's still pretty entertaining with an interesting cast. Geena Davis probably deserved top billing except for Tom Hanks's star status when the film came out, but that's a small nit-pick. I didn't care much for Hanks's character in most of the early part of the picture, he was just too lewd and crude. What really got my attention though was the brief sidebar about how the formation of the league was responsible for the 'masculinization of women', a theme that might be addressed some day in reverse, with the very apparent 'feminization of men' in the culture today. Not to mention the idea of 'safe spaces' for those of both sexes who find it just a bit too hard to cope with reality when it rears it's ugly head.But I digress. This is an enjoyable little flick for sports and non-sports fans alike. I would like to have seen more of Jon Lovitz as the wise-guy baseball scout; he had the best lines in the story. And Madonna seemed to be appropriately cast as 'dirt in the skirt' Mae Mordabito, who's real talent showed up at Willie's Suds Bucket. One of the more memorable game scenes had Hanks and Davis going at it in that battle of the batting signals when Marla Hooch (Megan Cavanagh) came up to the plate. It preceded Coach Dugan's (Hanks) second best line in the story - "Way to go, whatever your name is." Finally, at the risk of offending half the audience here, I think Dottie Hinson (Davis) dropped the ball on purpose. And in keeping with the general tenor of the league's avowed determination to deliver an entertaining and properly respectful entertainment, I thought she did it gracefully and grandly.

Finally, after 20+ years, I recorded and watched what I thought was going to be a middling Tom Hanks comedy. Reason for that was the trailers I'd seen hundreds of times: "Crying. There's no crying in baseball!"What I saw was a movie that should have been allowed to give Unforgiven serious competition for Best Picture and Geena Davis an Oscar for Best Actress in a leading role. Apparently I wasn't the only one fooled by those trailers.Penny Marshall's movie is a brilliant, beautifully crafted homage to a little remembered period when, just as Rosie became a riveter, numbers of talented women filled in for their men as ball players. Proving, like Rosie, they were every bit as capable as the absent males.More than that, of course, is the broader theme of the individual refusing to buckle under to social conventions. A very common American theme with Marshall's contribution ranking with the best of its expositions. Pretty good as a Baseball pic, too.It is a long movie, over 2 hours, but, despite the simplicity of the story, it doesn't play like two hours. From the first scene you (or at least I) fall in love with the screen and time becomes meaningless.Two people, supported by a strong supporting cast, are responsible: Peggy Marshall and Geena Davis. Marshall and her editor crafted a truly remarkable piece of cinematography that may be perfect; not a clang or misstep anywhere.Such movies need glue to make it all hang together and that's where Davis comes in: though brilliantly supported, without Davis the whole house would have failed. League is very much Geena Davis' movie, she's the one who puts flesh to the bones of Penny Marshall's vision.As Americans we love and should love movies like this, these celebrations of the best of our values, of how hundreds of women kept a league of their own alive for ten years.That achievement was quickly forgotten, buried in the reactionary conservatism of the '50s, which should anger us, but that anger can easily be tempered by Marshall's rediscovery and loving treatment of their story.For all of that seriousness, League is a successful comedy and fun to watch while, also successfully, demonstrating both how far we've come and how far yet to go.A large part of that 'yet to go' are those trailers that made me think that League was a Tom Hanks movie. It isn't; Hanks is almost a tertiary figure. Davis and the supporting cast, all women, are the Stars. Hanks character, Jimmy Dugan, is important and, especially at the last, honored but, as the movie unfolds, more comic relief than mover. Very much a second fiddle; to his credit, Hanks plays that fiddle masterfully.However, the fact that the distributors felt the need to exaggerate his presence to the point of ridiculousness speaks volumes about how, even in 1992, we weren't ready to embrace a movie by women about women. The Oscar's Nominating Committee's failure to recognize League as the masterpiece it is stamps paid to that point.As a movie, judged by objective cinematic standards, League should rank with the best of the best.

Two sisters (Davis & Petty) help make the first ever professional baseball league. They make sure it's successful, but problems begin to commence. Manager Jimmy Duggan (Hanks) is a former star player that has a drinking problem and refuses to take the job seriously. Meanwhile, tension brews among the girls. This was a really good movie! I'm a guy, but I've always thought men and women should have equal rights. I'm not sexist and I try to not discriminate. They mirrored the time period precisely and I enjoyed the look of the field and the baseball uniforms. The baseball action is exciting as well. Some of the catches the girls made were very athletic. Geena Davis and Lori Petty are the heart of this movie! Their passion and intensity really made this movie. They were on the top of their games. Hanks is excellent as he always is, but he has tremendous support. Even Rosie O'Donnell is admittedly solid, and I can't stand her! Madonna adds star power. The ending is very heartwarming and made me smile. Baseball fans and movie fans in general shouldn't have much to complain about! It's exciting, engrossing, and riveting. Check it out!8/10