Comments On Fever Pitch

[savage1]

I just got back from the movie, and I thorougly enjoyed it.
I would preface my remarks by saying that if you didn't like romantic comedies like Maid in Manhattan, Jersey Girl, etc., chances are you won't like this either.
That is not the case with me, as I love good romantic comedies, and this one certainly is good.
Everyone knows the story by now-fanatic Red Sox fan meets corporate girl, but the latter has to get used to "sharing" him with his love for the Sox.
Yes, the movie is predictable at times but is also very funny;wait until you see the guys apartment strewn with just about every Red Sox souvenir and relic imaginable.
The movie has a sense of the bizarre at times, but you will have to see it to see what I mean, as I don't want to spoil it.
I would say that I especially enjoyed the movie not only because of the story itself but because it is replete with action both around Fenway and in the actual game itself, both of which are easy for me to identify with.
This is a must picture for any fan who loves his team and whose wife or girlfriend cannot understand the obsession;in that sense I guess it is a chick flick.
This movie will not win any Academy Awards, but for me I found it touching, funny and overall extremely enjoyable and well worth the time and money.
I would love to hear what you people think about the movie;Frank in another thread gave it a so-so review.

[illjaunt]

Savage, my wife has been begging me to take her to it, lol

[savage1]

Savage, my wife has been begging me to take her to it, lol

Illjaunt-if your wife thinks you spend too much time with sports and/or (gulp) gambing or for that matter any thong else, you should take her tonight.
You can bring along your pager(if you have one) to keep track of the games.
Actually, the more I think about it, I more I think this movie will not only help wives and girlfriends understand our obsession with certain teams and sports in general but maybe(hopefully anyways)our obession with gambling;obsessions are obsessions, you know..

[uconnplayer]

I loved it...but the ending sucked!

[savage1]

I loved it...but the ending sucked!

I agree-the ending seemed too forced, rushed, contrived and cute if you get my drift;it didn't seem to fit in with the rest of the movie;I can excuse it though because the rest of the movie including the acting and funny lines and scenes were so good.

[BIGJOHN]

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2...simmons/050420

Good article by the best writer around..Bill Simmons

[savage1]

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2...simmons/050420

Good article by the best writer around..Bill Simmons

It is a well written article, but obviously I disagree with it.
By the way Roger Ebert generally acclaimed to be one of the best and most respected film critics of our time gave it 3 1/2 stars out of a possible 4.
Movies like opinions on who is going to cover in a particular game are open to a wide variance of opinion.
I personally liked it as much if not more than any romantic comedy I have seen in some time.

[BIGJOHN]

It is a well written article, but obviously I disagree with it.
By the way Roger Ebert generally acclaimed to be one of the best and most respected film critics of our time gave it 3 1/2 stars out of a possible 4.
Movies like opinions on who is going to cover in a particular game are open to a wide variance of opinion.
I personally liked it as much if not more than any romantic comedy I have seen in some time.

Yep, I can not comment on it because I have yet to see it. I hope to see it soon though..
You are correct about opinions..It's amazing home one person can really like a movie while another one thinks it sucked

[SustainDan]

Well I loved it the ending was rushed because they originally had the Red Sox losing since they were down 0-3

[savage1]

Roger Ebert's review of the movie follows:
It must be Nick Hornby who understands men so well, and how they think about women, and how women think about them. His books have been the starting point for three wonderful movies about the truce of the sexes: "High Fidelity" (2000), "About a Boy" (2002) and now "Fever Pitch." Their humor all begins in the same place, with truth and close observation. We know these people. We dated these people. We are these people.

Because "Fever Pitch" involves a Boston Red Sox fan and takes place during the miraculous 2004 season, do not make the mistake of thinking it is a baseball movie. It is a movie about how men and women, filled with love and motivated by the best will in the world, simply do not speak the same emotional language. She cannot understand why he would rather go to spring training camp in Florida than meet her parents. He cannot understand why this is even an issue.

Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon star, as Lindsey and Ben, both around 30. She thinks it may be time to get married. He already seems married, to the Red Sox. His love for the team, he confesses to her, "has been a problem with me ... and women." She is a high-paid business executive. He is a high school teacher.

Should she date below her income level? She has a strategy meeting with her girlfriends. When men have these meetings, they talk about how a woman really understands them. Women talk about how a man doesn't really understand them. Men talk about how a woman looks. Women ask questions like: "Where has he been?" Ben is 30 and single. Lindsey at least knows why she's still single: She works all the time.

Their first date begins unpromisingly, with food poisoning and Lindsey hurling into a garbage can. But Ben is a nice guy and cleans up, puts her to bed, sleeps on the couch. In no time at all, they're in love. What she doesn't understand is, she's in love with Winter Guy.

Summer Guy is a Red Sox fan. She is from Venus, he is from Fenway Park. He has season tickets. The people in the nearby seats are his "summer family." When they talk Red Sox lore, it sounds like they know what they're talking about. When he considers selling his season tickets, they observe that "technically" he's supposed to return them to the team. His apartment looks like a sports memorabilia store. Even the telephone is made out of a baseball mitt. She looks at the T-shirts and warm-up jackets in his closet, and says, "This is not a man's closet."

Jimmy Fallon is perfectly cast in the role. "Saturday Night Live" veterans tend to disappear into the fourth dimension of "SNL" "comedies" that are usually pretty bad. Only occasionally does someone like Bill Murray find a wider range of roles. Fallon was recently in the awful "Taxi," but here it must be said (as it could be said about John Cusack in "High Fidelity" and Hugh Grant in "About a Boy") that you cannot imagine anyone else in the role. He achieves a kind of perfection in his high spirits, his boyish enthusiasm, his dependence on the Sox for a purpose in his life, and his bafflement about romance. He doesn't know that Freud's dying words were allegedly, "Women! What do they want?" But he would have understood them.

Drew Barrymore is also perfectly cast, in part because in real life, as in the movie, she's not only adorable but also a high-powered businesswoman (she is listed first among the film's producers). Her Lindsey likes Ben because he is a good and nice man, funny, considerate and sexy. That's the Winter Guy. The Summer Guy is also all of those things, when his busy schedule as a Red Sox fan permits him. "All those things you feel for that team," she tells him in despair, "I feel them, too, for you."

Well, come on. Think how the guy feels. The Sox are down 0-3 to the Yankees in the AL playoffs and behind in the fourth and apparently final game. He's at a party she wanted him to attend. He's at a party she wanted him to attend. He has a great time at the party, until he finds out the Sox were down 0-3 to the Yankees, tied it up, and won 6-4 in the 12th inning. That will be a moment that he will always, always, regret missing. Is he a fool? I would like to say that he is, but if I hadn't seen the final four minutes of the Illinois game against Arizona, when they came from 15 behind to tie it up and win in overtime!, I would have been ... discontented.

Yes, it's only a game. There's a bright little boy in the movie who says to Ben, "Let me just leave you with this thought. You love the Sox, but have they ever loved you back?" Lindsey loves him back. But one transgression follows another. Consider her thoughts as she watches the TV news, which shows her being hit by a foul ball and knocked out, while next to her Ben jumps up and down in excitement and hasn't noticed his girl is unconscious. Women remember things like that.

The movie has been directed by the Farrelly brothers, Peter and Bobby, who tend to make a different kind of movie ("Dumb and Dumber," "Kingpin," "There's Something About Mary," "Stuck on You"). Here, they're sensitive and warm-hearted, never push too hard, empathize with the characters, allow Lindsey and Ben to become people we care about.

What's going on? First Danny ("Trainspotting") Boyle makes "Millions," and now this. Maybe the Farrellys were helped by the script by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, who have nine children between them, and whose writing collaborations include "Parenthood," "Forget Paris," and "A League of Their Own," which knew a lot about baseball.

What's really touching is the way Lindsey works and works to try to understand Ben. When he tries to tell her why he loves the Red Sox even though they always, always let him down, she says, "You have a lyrical soul. You can live under the best and worst conditions." What she doesn't understand is that the girlfriend of a Red Sox fan must also endure the best and the worst, and have a soul not only lyrical but forgiving. How does it feel when his Sox tickets are always more important than anything she suggests? "Here's a tip, Ben," she says. "When your girlfriend says let's go to Paris for the weekend -- you go."
.

[frankb03]

I rate movies based on Do I want to see the movie again, How soon and how many times. It was an OK movie. I'd never watch the movie a second time.

[illjaunt]

Illjaunt-if your wife thinks you spend too much time with sports and/or (gulp) gambing or for that matter any thong else, you should take her tonight.
You can bring along your pager(if you have one) to keep track of the games.
Actually, the more I think about it, I more I think this movie will not only help wives and girlfriends understand our obsession with certain teams and sports in general but maybe(hopefully anyways)our obession with gambling;obsessions are obsessions, you know..

I took her to see the Interpreter it was pretty good well see maybe this week I will take her to Fever Pitch. Thanks for the great thread!

[savage1]

I rate movies based on Do I want to see the movie again, How soon and how many times. It was an OK movie. I'd never watch the movie a second time.

Movies in general are very subjective-some folks love strictly action and adventure movies;some like comedies, some prefer musicals.
Obviously one's preferences in movies in general has a lot to do whether he/she would want to see a movie a second time.
Someone might want to see a suspenseful thriller for example more than once, whereas for someone like me even it is a good movie, one viewing is usually enough.

[Mike1]

Someone might want to see a suspenseful thriller for example more than once, whereas for someone like me even it is a good movie, one viewing is usually enough.

I also prefer to watch a movie only once, and if I really liked it I might watch it a second time