It was...."Perfect"

Rating: Null/10 (12 March 2001)

I have always loved baseball. I have always loved the movies. Somehow, a marriage of the two has never worked, with the exception perhaps of A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN. Even Kevin Costner's two previous highly rated diamond films BULL DURHAM and FIELD OF DREAMS struck out with me.
Other baseball films, such as THE BABE, make me cringe to think a whole generation of kids are growing up believing one of the greatest athletes of the twentieth century was only a stumbling, bumbling, overweight slob who, everytime he came to bat, wound up on his ass with two strikes on him, only to somehow get back up and hit the ball out of the park on the third pitch.
FOR LOVE OF THE GAME finally delivers the goods to make a film about the national pastime believable. Even if it were not about baseball, the dramatic, romantic story of Billy Chapel, played by Costner, and his love interest, Jane Aubrey, played by Kelly Preston, is intriguing.
Chapel is a 39-year-old pitcher, in the twilight of a Hall-Of-Fame career, pitching for a beleaguered Detroit Tigers franchise that, like Chapel, has seen better days. As a long, frustrating season winds to a close, Chapel learns the team has been sold and, as part of the deal, he is being traded to the San Francisco Giants. On the same day, Aubrey, Chapel's long-suffering girl friend who has stood by him through his ups and downs for five years, announces she is leaving him. Chapel has always put baseball first throughout their relationship, never giving Jane the same commitment he has given the game.
As he pitches against the Yankees in his last game of the season, Chapel ponders his fate. Will he go along with the trade and continue his career with another team? Will he retire and call it a career, going out on top? What about Jane? All during the game, told through flashback, Chapel remembers how he met Jane and what she has meant to him over the past five years.
But something else is developing. As the game reaches the 7th inning, Chapel realizes he is on the verge of something only 16 pitchers in the history of baseball have ever attained....he is pitching a perfect game. The tension builds with every pitch as the game reaches a climax, and the outcome may well determine what Billy Chapel decides to do about the rest of his life.
A great supporting cast of John C. Reilly as Tiger catcher Gus Sinski, Jena Malone as Heather, Jane's rebellious teenage daughter, and Vin Scully, probably the greatest baseball announcer ever, playing himself, give this film credibility. The Yankee Stadium shots are stunning. But it is the performances of the two leads, Kevin Costner and Kelly Preston, that makes FOR LOVE OF THE GAME a winner.
Even if you don't like baseball, you'll like FOR LOVE OF THE GAME. If you do enjoy the game, don't miss this one. See if you don't agree it is the best baseball movie ever made.