Terrifc Crowd-Pleaser

Rating: Null/10 (29 February 2008)

Major League (1989)
**** (out of 4)
Wonderful crowd-pleaser about a group of misfit baseball players who are thrown together by an owner who hopes they're bad enough so that she can relocate the team to a new city in the off season. The players of the Cleveland Indians find out about this and decide to give it their all to become winners. MAJOR LEAGUE really isn't anything that we haven't seen before in countless sports movies. We have the typical stereotypes and the clichéd story and we all know how it's going to end. With that said, who says you can't take something old and make it fresh and exciting? This here is without question one of the best comedies of the 80s and I really think it keeps getting better with age. The movie really has one terrific scene after another as one can't help but fall in love with these losers, their situation and of course you want to see them win. What works so well is that we're given a terrific cast with Tom Berenger and Charlie Sheen leading the way as the wise vet and the wild rookie. The two of them work perfectly well together and certainly help keep the film going at a fast pace. The supporting cast gives us wonderful work by Corbin Bernsen, Margaret Whitton, James Gammon, Wesley Snipes, Charles Cyphers, Dennis Haysbert, Chelcie Ross and Rene Russo. We also have the priceless Bob Uecker who turns in one of the memorable roles in sports film history. The film is perfectly directed by David Ward who perfectly plays up the various comedy routines but he also manages to packs some wonderful tension during the final ballgame as the Indians go up against the Yankees. MAJOR LEAGUE has non-stop laughs from start to finish but we even get a little side romance and of course plenty of dirty jokes. The R-rating really helps this film because it just seems like one of those macho movies where guys talk dirty and it's all wonderfully funny.