The 10 Best Baseball Movies

With baseball season now at the halfway point there are some fans out there whose favorite team is already out of the pennant race and finishing the season .500 is their only goal or dream. Some fans are anxiously waiting to see what the second half will bring with hopes high that come October our teams will still be playing ball.

Baseball fans are also likely to be fans of baseball movies. Through the years there have been over 100 movies made about America's pastime but there aren't more then a handful that could be considered pennant winners in their own right.

Here is a list of my choices for the 10 best baseball movies made to date. If your favorite movie is not included that doesn't mean I didn't like it but perhaps I just liked these 10 better.

I am hopeful, as always, that someone reading this will see a title or two they have never seen and will seek out that film and enjoy it.

As usual this list is in alphabetical order and not by preference:

THE BAD NEWS BEARS (1976 - Director: Michael Ritchie) - One of the sleeper hits of 1976 has become one of the most beloved baseball movies of all time. Writer Bill (Son of Burt) Lancaster fashioned this true to life look at little league baseball and how sometimes adults take it far more seriously then the kids playing the game. Walter Matthau stars as Morris Buttermaker, a former minor league pitcher whose best days are behind him. Now he is a heavy drinking pool cleaner who is hired by a local city councilman to manage a new team filled with misfits, none of whom seem to be able to play baseball very well. After a few disastrous games Buttermaker enlists the aid of an ex-girlfriend's daughter, Amanda (Tatum O'Neal), who has a wicked curve ball and becomes the team's pitcher. Add to the mix one Kelly Leak, the town bad boy who would rather ride his motorcycle, smoke cigarettes and pick up girls. He also happens to be the best athlete in town and soon the fortunes of the Bears begin to turn. This alternately funny and serious film is not bogged down by clichés but is quite perceptive in its look at the hunger for victory at all costs. The film also contains a terrific, unexpected but very true to life ending. The film was such a hit it inspired two sequels (1977's Bad News Bears In Breaking Training and 1978's Bad News Bears Go To Japan) and a short lived television series.

BANG THE DRUM SLOWLY (1973 - Director: John Hancock) - One of the most touching of sports movies is this tale of the friendship between two pro baseball players, one a pitcher (Michael Moriarty) and one a catcher (Robert DeNiro). Henry, the pitcher, is one of the stars of the team while Bruce, the catcher, is not. During the off season Bruce finds out he is terminally ill and shares this with Henry who is his best friend. The film then centers on the next season where Bruce's teammates try to help him through the season and make it one for the books. This is a sweet story of friendship and loyalty and may be overlooked these days but is worth remembering and finding.

THE BINGO LONG TRAVELING ALL-STARS AND MOTOR KINGS (1976 - Director John Badham) - This is another wonderful baseball comedy that has slipped through the cracks over the years and deserves to be found and watched by new generations. Billy Dee Williams stars as Bingo Long, a Negro League baseball player who decides to branch out with his own team after poor treatment from the owner of the team he was playing on. With that he takes some players with him and finds more on the road as they travel the country playing games against any team that will play them. Williams leads an impressive cast of African-American actors including James Earl Jones, Richard Pryor, DeWayne (Otis Day) Jessie, Tony Burton and Stan Shaw.

BULL DURHAM (1988 - Director: Ron Shelton) - A favorite movie for real life baseball players is this comedy written and directed by Shelton, a former minor league baseball player in his own right. This romantic comedy stars Kevin Costner as "Crash" Davis, a longtime minor league catcher sent to A ball to tutor an up and coming pitcher whose wildness needs to be brought under control. While there both are romanced by Annie, a Walt Whitman quoting team groupie who picks one player and grooms him for the big leagues as well. This is a funny and observant look at life in the minor leagues with non-stop travel and watching others dreams come true while you wait for your turn. Tim Robbins, Robert Wuhl and Susan Sarandon (in one of her best roles) co-star.

EIGHT MEN OUT (1988 - Director John Sayles) - A strong look at the true story of the players of the 1919 White Sox and how eight of them decided to throw the World Series and take payoffs from gamblers because of owner Charles Comiskey's frugal treatment towards them. Once started the gamblers welshed on the promise of further pay and the players were stuck and had no choice but to cooperate. Two years later the truth was discovered and the players were indicted but found innocent by a jury of their peers. The incident caused owners to create a position of Commissioner and gave the job to Kenisaw Mountain Landis, who promptly banned the 8 players for life. An impressive cast is headed by D.B. Sweeney, John Cusack, Michael Rooker, Charlie Sheen, David Strathairn, Clifton James, John Mahoney, Studs Terkel and Christopher Lloyd. Writer/director Sayles gave himself a small but important role as a sports writer and almost steals the movie when he greets the players on the train and, knowing something is suspicious, sings I'm Forever Blowing Ball Games to them.

FEVER PITCH (2005 - Directors: Peter Farrelly and Bobby Farrelly) - From the directors of Dumb and Dumber; Kingpin and There's Something About Mary comes this bright and funny film about a die hard Boston Red Sox fan (well played by Jimmy Fallon) who falls in love with a corporate workaholic (Drew Barrymore) and romances her all winter. Once spring rolls around she is taken aback at his obsessive devotion to his baseball team. This is a sweet, sometimes serious but always funny look at how sometimes you can go overboard loving your favorite sports team. This is a perfect movie for couples.

FIELD OF DREAMS (1989 - Director: Phil Alden Robinson) - One of the great films of the last 20 years is this tale of an Iowa farmer (Kevin Costner) who one days hears voices and interprets the message as an instruction to build a baseball field so the spirit of Shoeless Joe Jackson (Ray Liotta), banned for the 1919 Black Sox scandal, can return and play ball with his seven teammates and other famous ball players. Despite the fact that he risks losing the land from foreclosure, the farmer finds a reclusive novelist (James Earl Jones) and brings him back after hearing another message, for reasons not directly known at the time. Amy Madigan and Burt Lancaster co-star in one of the great feel good movies of all time, a movie that most men end up becoming emotional about and featuring a memorable musical score by James Horner.

A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN (1992 - Director: Penny Marshall) - A look at the Woman's Professional Baseball League, formed when many Major League players went off to fight in WWII. Geena Davis and Lori Petty star as farm girl sisters who are picked to try out for one of the teams and soon become rivals, even though they are on the same team. Tom Hanks also stars as the team's manager, an alcoholic former big leaguer given one last chance by the league's owner. Madonna, Rosie O'Donnell, David Strathairn, Bill Pullman and director Garry (brother of Penny) Marshall also star in this fitfully funny and tender drama which concludes in the modern day with a reunion of the team (played by unknown look-alikes) at Baseball's Hall of Fame when the Women's League was finally recognized and inducted. This is a wonderful feel good movie loved by most that saw it.

THE NATURAL (1984 - Director: Barry Levinson) - Based on Bernard Malamud's novel, the film tells the story of farm boy Roy Hobbs who dreams of being a great baseball player and even fashions a bat (Wonderboy!) out of a piece of a tree that was struck by lightning on his farm. Hobbs (Robert Redford) begins to make his dream a reality when he is unexpectedly met with tragedy. Some 20 years later Hobbs re-appears and takes his last shot at making it playing with a bunch of rag tag losers and starts turning the fortunes of the team around. The film is shot as a fantasy and the viewer gets sucked in making its flaws seem slight. Randy Newman provides one of the most memorable film scores in history and the film is aided by one of the best supporting casts ever assembled including Joe Don Baker, Kim Basinger, Wilford Brimley, Glenn Close, Robert Duvall, Richard Farnsworth, Barbara Hershey, Michael Madsen, Darren McGavin and Robert Prosky.

THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES (1942 - Director: Sam Wood) - One of the great biopics of all time is this re-telling of the life of Lou Gehrig (Gary Cooper), the famous New York Yankees first baseman who would play in 2,130 consecutive games until he was forced out by illness with the disease ALS that would kill him at the age of 37 and become known as "Lou Gehrig's Disease." The film traces his life from childhood and concludes with one of the great emotional scenes of all time when Gehrig addressed a standing room only crowd at Yankee Stadium and gave his now famous 'Luckiest Man on the Face of the Earth' speech. Even the most hardened movie fans will have a tough time not shedding a tear before this film ends.