The Winning Season

I'm a Pittsburgher with an above average knowledge of the Pirate history and Honus Wagner. Many things about the movie were well done. The recreation of Forbes Field, though imperfect, was better than expected. The portrayal of Wagner seemed to be generally on the mark. The protrayal of Cobb, on the other hand, seemed patentely unfair and overstated like I suspect most modrern-day portrayals of Cobb are. Let's face it though, this movie is above all a kids fantasy as is the book upon which it is based. The story in the book holds together better in my opinion. All that being said I will purchase it for my collection should it ever be released as a DVD.

There are all sorts of problems with this movie, which I will leave for others to point out.

At its best, this movie tells a wonderful story, that of a little boy who loves baseball but isn't very good at it. He is granted an astounding opportunity, that he doesn't even ask for: he gets to play baseball with one of the early greats, Honus Wagner, against one of the early Satans - and greats - Ty Cobb. It is every little boy's fantasy, and he gets to live it.

The rest of the movie is sentimental, like a Hallmark Hall of Fame special. That's all very nice, of course.

But the little boy's fantasy, which will be understood by any man who has not grown so old as to have forgotten what it was like to be a little boy, is golden.

I have no idea if this movie has anything to say to women. Perhaps not. I've never been a woman, so I can't say.

But if you were ever a little boy and loved baseball, no matter how bad you were at it, this movie has a lot to say to you.

I just want to say that I love this movie. But I also want to say that it's a movie not be taken seriously. It's a fantasy. It's a baseball fantasy. Just like "Field of Dreams." As a pseudo baseball historian, I appreciate the details given to the baseball uniforms, the player's gloves and catcher's equipment and both team's stadiums. I also like how the stadiums were depicted in a neighborhood setting with the surrounding industries, which in 1909, they were. I admit that the movie does try to convey a message that takes awhile to get across. But once it does, it all makes sense and it makes you smile if you can forgive the historical inaccuracies.

This movie won't go down in history as a all-time great, but it will always be one of my favorites.

This is the best new baseball movie I've seen in ages,Big (Tom Hanks) crossed with Field of Dreams and 8 Men Out....The reproduction of the way life was turn of the century Pittsburgh was excellent and looked as real as if you were there...The actors who were cast as the ball players & especially the portrayal of Honus Wagner by Matthew Modine and Ty Cobb by William Lee Scott were incredible....The movie has a feel good ending,a kid overcoming adversity on the ball field,problems at home with his family,discovering he's grown up & gone back in time,a little love story for the ladies,this movie just absolutely has it all!!!!!A Great movie for the entire family.....

The direction on this TBS TV movie is good, the performances are fine, the photography is handsome and interesting, but the script is a bit of a muddled mess. Nominally about life lessons and the importance of following your dreams, the movie turns into a rather mushy and ill-defined wish-fulfillment fantasy all around.

Joe's family is suffering through a bout of poverty when he comes across a rare baseball card of Honus Wagner worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. But the card does not solve his family's financial problems. Instead it sends him back to the 1909 World Series where he meets Wagner, and makes him several years older. Then later, after it appears to have all been a dream, it works further, concrete magic. This is a problem with ill-defined fantasy: if it can do anything, then it fails to keep the story's allegorical sense straight.

The script is a bit better at hinting at the complexities of life as a professional ballplayer in the era that saw Wagner and Ty Cobb square off against each other in the World Series, but the main story is a bit random. Perhaps the novel it was drawn from simply had too many subplots for the screenwriter to handle elegantly.