Review of Moneyball (2011) by Majorbob — 04 Oct 2011

For once, the movie is better than the book. Much, much better! Brad Pitt (I'm not one of his fans) gives a performance worthy of an Oscar nomination. His portrayal of Billy Beane, the now famous General Manager of the Oakland A's gives life to a character than I found to be rather flat in the book of the same title. The supporting actors (except for Jonah Hill) are excellent and surprisingly the best of the bunch is Phillip Seymour Hoffman playing manager Art Howe.

The divorced father-daughter relationship is played just right and I thought the "flashbacks" to Beane's youth and professional playing days were well done. More importantly, live action scenes were blended seamlessly with archive footage of actual events during the 2001 and 2002 baseball seasons. I'd rank this film in my top ten sports movies and in a flat footed tie with "The Natural" as my all time favorite baseball movie.