Trouble with the Curve (2012)

The more of Clint Eastwood that I see, both on and off the screen, the more I wonder if he is acting at all.  This might just be him, playing himself, but he is reading the lines that someone else wrote.  Judging from his performance at the Republican National Convention this past summer, he should be mightily grateful to have those lines.

All of this sounds slightly petty and more than a little crabby--which is funny, because irascible old men are the role that Eastwood has consistently played this past decade (as opposed to the irascible young men that he used to portray).  Do not misunderstand me.  I liked this movie, despite the lack of chemistry that was generated by Amy Adams and Justin Timberlake.

The story is that Eastwood is a baseball scout of the old school.  He reads player's stats in the newspaper.  He goes to see them play to figure out who is just shining because there is no competition and who has what it takes to make it in the big leagues.   He has two major problems--the first is that he is way too old school.  The young scouts want him gone.  The other is that he has macular degeneration and he really cannot see any more.  He is given an ultimatum on a potential high school start, and much to his dismay, his daughter comes to join him, knowing that he can't actually watch the kid play--she is his eyes, and he uses his ears, and together they come to what appears at film's end to be the right decision.

This is a feel good movie about baseball, including the value of the old style approach to recruiting.  It has imbedded in it some lessons on what not to do as a parent.  Eastwood's wife died when his daughter was very young, and as he himself admits, he did not cope very well, and he never talked with her about it and he never apologized to her.  As a result, she has been in therapy for years, and is emotionally as unavailable as he is.  The outcome of that problem is less satisfactory than the baseball story, but that is the nature of the beast--business is neat and tidy, life is more messy.  Recommended, unless you absolutely hate sports movies.