X
- 2012
- PG-13
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 51 m
- 2012
- PG-13
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 51 m
Summary Gus Lobel has been one of the best scouts in baseball for decades, but, despite his efforts to hide it, age is starting to catch up with him. Nevertheless, Gus—who can tell a pitch just by the crack of the bat—refuses to be benched for what could be the final innings of his career. He may not have a choice. The front office of the Atlant...
Directed By: Robert Lorenz
Written By: Randy Brown
- 2012
- PG-13
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 51 m
- 2012
- PG-13
- Warner Bros.
- 1 h 51 m
Trouble with the Curve
58
6.6
Where to Watch
Summary Gus Lobel has been one of the best scouts in baseball for decades, but, despite his efforts to hide it, age is starting to catch up with him. Nevertheless, Gus—who can tell a pitch just by the crack of the bat—refuses to be benched for what could be the final innings of his career. He may not have a choice. The front office of the Atlant...
Directed By: Robert Lorenz
Written By: Randy Brown
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 40 Critic Reviews
58
43% Positive
17 Reviews
17 Reviews
50% Mixed
20 Reviews
20 Reviews
8% Negative
3 Reviews
3 Reviews
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 40 Critic Reviews
58
43% Positive
17 Reviews
17 Reviews
50% Mixed
20 Reviews
20 Reviews
8% Negative
3 Reviews
3 Reviews
A defiantly analog rejoinder to last year's tech-savvy baseball drama, "Moneyball," Robert Lorenz's square but sturdy directing debut rests on the wonderfully spiky chemistry between Eastwood and Amy Adams.
Regrettably, it is not a home run or a perfect game, but it isn't a wild throw, an errant bunt or a dropped fly ball either. Trouble With the Curve is either an off-speed pitch that just catches the edge of the strike zone or a bloop single lofted into right field. The runner is safe. The movie is too.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 98 User Ratings
6.6
59% Positive
58 Ratings
58 Ratings
30% Mixed
29 Ratings
29 Ratings
11% Negative
11 Ratings
11 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 98 User Ratings
6.6
59% Positive
58 Ratings
58 Ratings
30% Mixed
29 Ratings
29 Ratings
11% Negative
11 Ratings
11 Ratings
Little known Amy Adams whose roles include “The Muppet's” and “The Master” delivers an inspiring role as Mickey in this Clint Eastwood directed classic. I find Amy’s performance as Mickey aspiring as a young woman seeking to balance her life as a lawyer at an Atlanta law firm and spending time with her estranged baseball scout dad “Gus”. Played by Client Eastwood, “Gus” is an aging baseball scout who uses his natural ability to watch, listen, and read a players talent by instinct, not any digital aged devices.
Mickey joins her dad, whose relationship is divided by career paths, to scout the Atlanta Braves next #1 draft pick. Like myself, Amy’s character is a huge baseball fan with knowledge of the game and its history, but since her childhood trauma, Gus had left her with an uncle when she was a young child. It is this time that Mickey’s spends with her dad I find invaluable, but her career begins to suffer as she spends the time with her dad. These strong traits she exhibits are motivating, as one who grows up without her parents to one who is willing to give of herself and work with the stresses from her law firm, are traits to draw inspiration from.
This movie has all the ebb and flows of a true to life movie that we as movie goers lose out on in the age of comic book and robotic hero movies. This movie represents what a strong 10 rating should be, with strong performances by some new and older actors.
Report
Baseball movies tend to be lyrical, deeply felt, aggressively metaphorical and (consequently) terrible, but Trouble With the Curve has something most others lack: Eastwood's superb, cruel sense of humor, which reaches all the way back to "Every Which Way But Loose."
Ends up being the kind of movie we don't see a whole lot anymore: an emotionally grounded and quietly meaningful crowd-pleaser that functions as a lovely antidote to the recently ended summer blockbuster season.
This is a character we have seen a million times before and Eastwood brings little that's new or original to the part. The movie as a whole can be labeled with the same criticism.
Adams is absolutely winning in this role, which requires her to be a tough-as-nails attorney, grownup tomboy, and psychologically scarred adult. And she makes a good foil for Eastwood, though it's often uncomfortable to see the actor going through melodramatic paces.
Lacking narrative momentum, saddled with thin characterizations and uninspired plotting, Trouble With The Curve should've stayed on the bench.
Any self-respecting baseball fun will cringe at the dialog involving the game. Then there is the stupid usual class warfare arising from pitting the big, cocky, southern dummy against the hard-working but talented Hispanic kid who just needs a break. Give it a rest. I would rank this at the bottom of most baseball-themed flicks.
Report
the title and the last act..
Trouble With The Curve
Trouble With The Curve is a plot driven sport drama about a bonding between a father and daughter that is resolved through their mutual interest. The structure is familiar, the conversations are cheesy, the writing is sloppy and the execution is daft. Ticking for almost two hours, their barely resides a fifteen minutes of craft worth to explore onto. Not a single thread of the feature allows the audience to root for the characters and even though the stakes gets higher, the tale never lives up to its repercussions that it ought to breed. The chemistry between Adams and Eastwood is uncomfortably itchy whilst hers with Timberlake is flat out annoying. And the primary reason to that would be writing that isn't polished or edited or bred appropriately for it to either respect the sincerity or the crisp of it. Addition to that, the knack for imputing humor forcibly, shucks away the earned integrity and undermines the momentum. The characters are undercooked and walks on benignly projected track that develops on unstable writing material. It falls flatly on technical aspects like background score, editing, cinematography and sound department. The camera work too is imaturely handled with no whatsoever courtesy to at least try to convince the audience. Brown's writing is questionable whilst Lorenz's execution is redundant at points where his conventional bubble bursts before it is even in existent. Adams and Eastwood may try hard but there isn't room enough to chew in the character's perspective while Timberlake on the other hand is flat out one dimensional with Goodman's decent support. The title and the last act are the only high points of this feature. Trouble With The Curve is actually a trouble for the makers, viewers and the actors who all deserved better, a lot better.
Report
Production Company
Warner Bros.,
Malpaso Productions
Release Date Sep 21, 2012
Duration 1 h 51 m
Rating PG-13
Tagline Whatever Life Throws at You
Awards
Hollywood Film Awards
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
National Board of Review, USA
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Georgia Film Critics Association (GAFCA)
• 1 Nomination
