Formulaic and pretty boring

Rating: 5/10 (10 February 2015)

'Million Dollar Arm' is a formulaic feel-good sport movie produced by Disney, just like tons of other films that you can see every day on their TV channels.
The movie stars Jon Hamm as JB, a sport agent who comes to India to find new baseball talents to help his struggling career, and in the process, learns to enjoy life. Right from the first 10 minutes, you can already see a big problem with the movie's direction: its inconsistent tone. One moment it is all cheerful and comedic with Indian music in the background, and right in the next, it shifts to Jon Hamm's character angrily punching his driving wheel in the fashion of Brad Pitt in Moneyball. It's like the movie can't even decide whether it wants to be just a fun family film or a more daring and emotional one. And in the end, it became neither. It's not either comedic or exciting enough to be fun, and it's just far too safe to be really emotional. None of the characters, including the lead, ever really stray off-course. Everyone seems nice, understanding and reasonable. Even when there are some kinds of disagreement, JB will always come to his senses and sort things out shortly after.
As the result, it's quite clear after a while that's the movie doesn't really have anything to tell, and has to rely on cheesy drama to keep things going. And even then, instead of focusing on the direct relationship between JB and his Indian players, the movie cops out and uses Brenda, his tenant played by Lake Bell, to represent them and simplify all conflicts even further.
The only positive thing about 'Million Dollar Arm' is that it has a fairly good cast. Jon Hamm does his best with what little materials the role gives him, while Lake Bell and Pitobash are both surprisingly good in some scenes.
'Million Dollar Arm', like most formulaic Disney sport films, is not bad. It has its moment thanks to the cast, but there's really nothing memorable about it.