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The Rookie
**1/2
Cinema Releases - October 11, 2002
Rated on a 4-star scale. Certificate U. USA.
127 minutes. Directed by John Lee Hancock. Written by Mike Rich. Starring
Dennis Quaid, Rachel Griffiths, Jay Hernandez, Beth Grant, Angus T. Jones,
Brian Cox, Rick Gonzales, Chad Lindberg, Angelo Spizzirri, Royce D.
Applegate.
I have an affection for "The
Rookie", but remain unsure about whether to recommend it. For months
I have been wondering whether I gave the insubstantial later passages of
"A Beautiful Mind" too easy a ride in my three-star review, and now I am
again in quandary. This is not a bad film, it just skims over too much for
us to ignore, and even when I was involved, a feeling nagged at me that I
was being won over by Dennis Quaid's easy charm and concepts rather than
content.
Quaid plays Jim Morris, a high school science
teacher from Texas who also coaches the baseball team, and once threw a wicked
pitch, but never made it to the big leagues. Just for kicks, he demonstrates
his throwing on the field one day, and everyone is amazed. The guy can spin
a ball at 95mph, and, as one character says, "You can count on one hand the
number of people who can do that."
The students aren't playing too well, so Quaid
attempts to give them a lecture on the importance of having dreams and never
giving up. If you have a cavalier attitude about anything you're voluntarily
involved in as a kid, says the teacher, then you're letting the fire inside
you stop burning. The kids submit that Quaid should listen to his own advice,
and make another try at baseball. And so a deal is struck: If the school
team can win the county championships, their coach will have one more stab
at becoming a professional ball player.
This could be a cross between two formulas: The
team of misfits that triumphs over all obstacles, and the guy who gets one
last shot at his lifelong dream. It's not even that, though, because "The
Rookie" has to get so many story steps into its two-hour running time that
key stretches are left without details. The kids on Quaid's team are well
played by young actors such as Jay Hernandez and Angelo Spizzirri, but we
don't spend enough time with individual kids to get a substantive sense of
their personalities, and their turnaround from losers to champs is seen in
one of those triumphant five-minute montages that seems to show everything
but really tells us nothing.
Same thing goes for the character played by Rachel
Griffiths, who is listed in the credits as 'Lorri Morris' but might as well
be called 'Jim's Wife'. She is described as a strong, independent Texan woman,
but there is not a single scene in which we find anything out about her own
life. Even in the moment where she tells of nights spent crying, we discover
that those tears have been caused by worry over her husband. Griffiths is
in the movie to stand around looking sexy, to reflect on the key events in
Quaid's life, and to give warm advice during pillow talk.
And yet "The Rookie" is not a boring film. At
times it is even touching. Quaid plays a good man, and in the early passages
of the film there are many quiet, poignant shots of him standing plainly
in his simple life, perhaps wondering about the glory days that never came.
The concept of a man who was on the track to greatness but never quite made
it is one that strikes chords in the heart of any person who dares to dream;
we've seen stories like this before, but this movie spends a lot of time
musing on that central theme, and it's hard to get out of our minds that
Jimmy Morris was a real guy, who really did make a wager with his students,
and really did lead them to victory before taking a plunge and getting to
play pro ball.
After "The Rookie" had ended, I left the cinema
feeling pleased, but also kinda hollow. The film lets us bask and reflect
rather than involving us in the meat of a story. It is a wholesome piece
of work, its lack of violence and language earning it a U certificate and
making it fine for family viewing. It is also well-meaning, sympathetic and
nice. As for whether it's accomplished, I simply cannot
decide.
COPYRIGHT©
2002 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
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