John Hamm. He’s a man’s man. He’s a woman’s man. He’s one of the few men who make five-o-clock shadows look desirable. And he’s one of even fewer men who’ve made chauvinistic marketing executives attractive. With more charisma than any human being should have, Disney lured him to star in Million Dollar Hamm… I mean arm… Million Dollar Arm… John Hamm…
Million Dollar Arm is based on a true story and if you’re a baseball fan, you may already know it. If you’re like me and you’ve never voluntarily watched baseball, then this should be news to you. In 2008, a reality competition was held in India called “The Million Dollar Arm” that sought to turn a cricket player into an American professional baseball player. The two winners of the competition were brought to the University of Southern California for training and later presented to Major League Baseball at tryouts with an entire county that was otherwise disinterested in baseball watching.
In the film, J.B. Bernstein is the down-on-his-luck co-owner of Seven Figures Management, a sports talent agency. In a last ditch effort to save his company, with inspiration from the likes of Susan Boyle and recent international sports superstars like Yao Ming, J.B. decides to hold a talent competition in India where cricket is the national pastime. He ends up finding two boys, Dinesh and Rinku, who he takes back to Los Angeles along with a translator and aspiring baseball coach named Amit. J.B.’s narrow focus on his business causes him to be blindsided when the boys aren’t succeeding. It will take help from his backyard tenant to show him how to be there for them and nurture their raw talent into success.
My favorite aspect of the film is that it’s a fish-out-of-water film. When J.B., played by Hamm (for more information, see paragraph 1), is in India everything is completely foreign to him. The driving method, the smells, the culture, the food, everything is new and he doesn’t understand it. When Dinesh and Rinku are in America, they are bewildered by elevator doors, the size of our TV’s, and the deliciousness of pizza. Conveniently, your local theater should offer overpriced mini-pizzas to curb the craving this will give you. Million Dollar Arm is definitely a popcorn movie… and a pizza movie.
This film is fun and lighthearted, at times maybe too much so. Marketing advertises that it is from the teams responsible for Miracle and The Rookie, both well received and successful sports films that touch your heart. This film lacks a lot of the sentiment that made those films so memorable. It also suffers from being overly predictable. The best moments of the film are not surprisingly Alan Arkin’s scenes. He plays a pessimistic talent scout J.B. hires to help him with the competition in India. It’s the same character he has played countless times, but it’s a welcome addition here and provides some of the biggest laughs in the film.
It’s hard to believe it’s been seven years since the last Disney sports film (2007’s The Greatest Game Ever Played). It’s a genre that they handle very well, but fans hoping to see a return to form of films like Remember the Titans won’t find the same inspirational team story here. This film is more about a selfish man learning to care about others and two underdogs who weren’t allowed to dream discovering they can do anything they want. It’s an enjoyable way to spend two hours on a hot day and will provide a nice alternative to the modern pre-historic rampage Godzilla which is its biggest box office competitor this weekend.
I give Million Dollar Arm 4 out of 5 baseball bats.