Pitt is tremendous as Billy Beane in this funny, smart, and highly entertaining movie about a man who changed baseball.(Columbia Pictures/aceshowbiz.com)
There are few sports books that I’ve ever read that were as interesting and fun to read as Moneyball was. From start to finish, you are engrossed in something you think you’ve known for a while (baseball), and are shown an angle completely different from what you could have ever expected to see. I also quickly became attached to the main characters and the interplay between them, especially the comedic aspects. Director Bennett Miller, screenplay writer Aaron Sorkin, and most of all the extraordinary cast led by Brad Pitt, all came together to turn a fantastic book into a fantastic movie. From start to finish, you’re going to want to pay attention to this one.
There is one quick note I have to get out of the way, and it differs slightly from the reviews I had read on this film before I went to see it. After seeing Moneyball, I’m not so sure that a person who isn’t at least somewhat familiar with baseball in general can come around to full comprehension of what’s going on and therefore would not fully appreciate it. That however, is my opinion, and if you’re on the fence, I would urge you to try it out. With that said…
A good sports movie is one of the hardest things to do right in Hollywood. For some reason, there have been more clunkers about sports, more cliche-ridden, color-by-numbers Disney type flicks about football, hockey, baseball, basketball, you name it. They consistently don’t cast well for another unknown reason, and it’s so damn predictable. Well if you had read Moneyball before seeing this, you knew what people who didn’t read it all found out about five minutes in – this isn’t like other sports movies. This is an outsider’s take on sports – literally. This movie challenges you to think about sports in a strict numbers sense, to treat it like a statistical breakdown that will evaluate what humans are right for each job. It’s an incredible story with a fantastic screenplay, and we’re also treated to a rusted-over, real feel of the Oakland Coliseum (not that hard – that place is apparently a dump).
But perhaps the best piece of this whole thing was Brad Pitt, playing Oakland G.M. Billy Beane. Just as I imagined from reading the book, Pitt was funny, sharp as tack, scheming, smart, and filled with spurts of anger. He absolutely nailed this part, and it also didn’t hurt that he had a great supporting cast around him. Jonah Hill – yes, the same one from Superbad, Knocked Up, and other comedies – has moments of comedy, but gives a solid go at only his second dramatic role.
I would be lying if I said this was the best sports movie I’ve ever seen – not the case. However, it is up there, pretty high up there. But comparisons aside, this turned out to be a rare combination: a great movie and a great book that don’t differ too damn much at all. That’s quite the find, and Moneyball is an original, fun, extremely interesting movie, with great editing and a great score too.
MONEYBALL: 
(out of 4)
Filed under: Movie review Tagged: | aaron sorkin, art howe, baseball, bennett miller, billy beane, brad pitt, chris pratt, jonah hill, moneyball, oakland a's, peter brand, philip seymour hoffman, robin wright, scott hatteberg
