Best movie of this year hands down!

Very Cool!!!

Just perfect...

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

I normally hate underdog movies,because they all have the same production mechanics, but this movie is the exact opposite. Movies like McFarland USA and any other sports movie ever,all have that same touchy-feely I won theme.The perfect game demonstrates how you can get any old underdog story and turn it into a movie with very high morality.The reason I think the perfect game is the only good sports movie is because all the other sports movies have nothing but oh this happens I need to win because were the underdogs ,but not this movie because it gives a sense of very high racially equality that all the other underdog movies don't have.The boys struggle and the coaches problems are very entertaining and not cliché at all.This movie raises high awareness not only for racial equality but a sense of how we all should be treated, something that most movies lack. Overall, this is a very original movie, Where everything feels like all movies should.

The Perfect Game is a nice, feel-good, crowd-pleasing, human values, baseball-packed movie. It is, indeed, based on a true story, but the fictional elements are so heavy and full of stereotypes, that they become a burden for the viewer and for the movie itself. The odd thing about it all is that some of the things that seem the most incredible are true. Yet still, a key character in the story -a Gringo- is left out of it. Why?Here come the spoilers.Something true. The basic line of the story is true. The 13 straight games won by the kids from Monterrey. The perfect game pitched by Àngel Macías -I watched him play as an outfielder for Poza Rica 7 years later-, some key plays. Things that may ring as an exaggeration are also true. Coach César Faz had been a bat-boy for the St.Louis Browns, the kids did cross the US- Mexico line walking in their baseball uniforms(it was a bridge, though); they ran against some racist behavior; there was an attempt to deport them in Biloxi, as their visas had expired; they were given discounts and even a free meal in local restaurants, as their legend grew; they ran out of money and depended on a fund raising effort in Monterrey; the uniforms they were offered for the final game were way too big for them; most of them were working class kids and even the relationship between coach César Faz and María is true. The little players did meet President Eisenhower and the Brooklyn Dodgers. This was more than enough to make a sound film.Something false. You don't make a baseball team in four weeks. The Liga Pequeña Industrial had been set four years prior to the championship. It was a proper Little League, with a proper field and stadium and they, of course, knew what a baseball looked like. The team had been playing together so long that they wore in 1957 the same uniform they had used in 1956 -when they beat other leagues in Monterrey-. Monterrey was an industrial city of half a million people, not a semi-rural town with a steel mill in the middle of nowhere, and baseball was the main sport played over there -in 1957 it had a strong team in the Mexican Baseball League, but not a first division soccer team-. César Faz was a US-born, after being deemed too short for MLB, decided to make a career as a manager. He coached Nuevo León State team to the National finals the year before, and was hired -nominally as a worker in FAMA machinery factory- to take the 12 year olds to the World Championship. There were 14 players, not 9, and there was no priest with them -even though it is said that they were religious children. And, at their arrival from the US, they were received by thousands of admirers both in Mexico City and in Monterrey. Something missing. One of the key men behind the Mexican kids' victory was an American, Harold "Lucky" Haskins, a former war-hero who helped fund, with his personal money, the Liga Pequeña Industrial, the working-class Little League where the champions came from. It was Haskins who gave them gloves, bats and uniforms, it was him who intervened to clear the visa problem for the children. It was him, the manager of FAMA machinery factory, who paid Faz. Why is he left out? Probably because he was a bigamist -not good for a religion oriented movie-, or probably because his intervention would prevent a couple of Hollywood clichés from appearing. Anyway, I felt it was an injustice done to a good man.

I just viewed the DVD of "The Perfect Game" and it left me somewhat bewildered as to why they attempted a theatrical release. The movie is not on that level. It would have been better served as a TV-movie. Set in 1957,it's based upon a very interesting true story about a group of impoverished Mexican kids who seek to establish a Little League team in their factory town. After coercing one of the factory workers with major league credentials (he was once a towel boy for the St. Louis Cardinals) to coach them,they gain membership in the league and defeat the highly touted rival Mexican team. Then,it's across the boarder into the United States and their quest for the Little League championship. You'd think that this would make a great movie. It didn't. Why? Two reasons. First,it was told in a lackluster manner. You've all seen the Little League playoff and championship games on TV over the years and they're very exciting. You don't feel any of that excitement in this movie. Second,the acting,for the most part,was flat. The only inspired performance was by Emilie de Ravin who played Frankie,a news reporter pressed into service,against her wishes,to cover the kids progress. She was spot-on playing her character. In fact,she has been spot-on in every performance that I've seen her in. Slowly,her character becomes won over by the kids as they win game after game in their march to the championship. Along the way,the team encounters a multitude of setbacks which they overcome with the help of others. In short,great story,bad presentation.

I was fortunate to see the film, compliments of studio movie grille, and I was not disappointed. I thought it was a classic "feel good" family movie. Yeah, it won't win any awards, but it will win over your heart. For some that need "deeper" in a movie for it to be worthy of praise, forget a' bout' it. It's simple and to the point, yeah, you know what's coming next, but that's alright, it's why we go the movies with our families!Get it, watch it, enjoy it. Yes, just that simple.I thought they did a good job of making it all look fifties. Just like the movie, simple times.