Film Review #134: Angels in the Outfield (1994)

 For those of you who know me personally, I have a one singular and personal love in my heart besides Disney Animation.  And that love is baseball.  Why?  Well, I've grown up around the game all my life, I played in four consecutive World Series in the Little League and while many in my family were much bigger Hockey and Football fans while I was growing up, Baseball was one of the few things in this world that was safely my own.  I got good at it at my own pace, though I wholeheartedly thank my father for showing me the ropes of the game I love.  In my final year of Little League, for a lousy Diamondbacks club (our Little League teams were named after the MLB teams), I was the only one who got more than 20 hits, drove in roughly 60% of my team's total runs and clubbed a home run that went over a fence that was nearly 350 feet away from home plate.  Unfortunately, an injury in High School Gym Class prevented me from being able to pursue any dreams I had of playing Baseball professionally.  Of course, there were other issues, but I never got to live that boyhood dream so many have.  

My love for baseball stemmed from a myriad of things, but one of the biggest things for me was the year 2002.  Why?  Well, there were a few things.  It was my first year of Little League and while I do vaguely remember much of the 2001 World Series from my time as a little boy, it was the 2002 World Series that gave me my love of baseball.  The Anaheim Angels played the San Francisco Giants in a thrilling Seven Game Series that gave the Angels their first Championship in Franchise History.  Disney just happened to own the team at the time, but that's mostly irrelevant to this review.  But if you believe in fate, while I was attending a Late Summer Yard Sale my mother's boyfriend was holding, I found a VHS tape that I had heard about for years, but never seen: Angels in the Outfield.  It was certainly ominous, considering what would unfold a few weeks later when the Angels stormed their way to the World Series.  I didn't really know the Angels were that good (heck, my team was the Mets and they were a tire fire), but I was content to see this movie for the first time in my life for all that it was worth.  And I loved it.  Nowadays, I find it a corny 90s Sports movie, but I've come to realize that while I do make fun of these kinds of movies all the time, the one that sticks with you almost always sticks with you.  Even this one, which is probably the hokiest and cheesiest film of the bunch.  But this movie gave me another spark to my love of baseball that eventually the 2002 World Series, Backyard Baseball and playing the game itself would only fuel.  And I have to thank this movie for that.  

Plot: Young kids Roger (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and J.P. (Milton Davis Jr) live in a foster home run by a woman named Maggie (Brenda Fricker).  The two are good friends and have a deep and passionate love for their favorite baseball team, the California Angels.  The team is in the midst of a 15 game losing streak and have slid all the way to last place, much to the chagrin of manager George Knox (Danny Glover).  When Roger's deadbeat father arrives and sarcastically claims that the best chance he and Roger can be a family again is when the Angels win the pennant, Roger prays for the Angels to start winning again.  

To the shock of everyone, including Roger, they do.  With the guidance of a primary angel by the name of Al (Christopher Lloyd), he explains to Roger that a group of angels have descended from heaven to help the team turn their season around, but also asks Roger not to tell anyone (though he allows Knox and J.P. to know).  Knox gives both Roger and J.P. tickets right by the Angels dugout so he could relay information to when the Angels were arriving and eventually the team goes on a run for first place, playing astonishingly amazing Baseball after the All Star Break to make it within a few games of the Divisional Pennant.  Knox becomes very close with both boys, but is unable to do much to support Roger after his father officially signs his son away to the state of California.  On top of that, with Roger dejected, J.P. inadvertently reveals to Knox's rival and Angels radio voice Ranch Wilder (Jay O. Sanders) the existence of the Angels.  This causes a press fiasco where the Angels owner contemplates firing Knox, but gives him a chance to defend himself at a press conference.  After doing what he could to inspire faith in Roger, Knox and the Angels team attend the press conference, where both Knox and Maggie give inspiring speeches that compel the Angels to declare they wouldn't play for any manager but Knox.  Knox keeps his job, much to the chagrin of Wilder, and the Angels head into the final game of the season against the Chicago White Sox with the pennant on the line.  

While the game is close one, Al comes before Roger and reveals to him that his angels cannot intervene on the team's behalf as they feel a Championship must be won on their own.  As Angels resurgent ace pitcher Mel Clark (Tony Danza) starts to wane and Knox contemplates taking him out of the game, Roger instills faith into George one last time and Clark secures the victory for the Angels and the team wins the pennant.  After returning home, Maggie announces that Roger has been adopted by someone and J.P. runs off.  Knox reveals that he was the one who adopted both Roger and J.P. and the two best friends and now adopted brothers happily embrace and celebrate their new family.  

What's Bad?: I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but despite how much I do personally enjoy this film, it is flawed.  Like, heavily flawed.  Outside of Danny Glover's acting as George Knox, the acting is about as cheesy as you could get.  It's amazing because not only would Joseph Gordon-Levitt have a solid acting career after this film, but two other relatively unknown actors with bit parts would also have excellent acting future for themselves in Adrien Brodie and Matthew McConaughey.  It's jarring to especially see McConaughey be in this for a bit part of being a dimwitted yet athletic center fielder for the Angels and later be the lawyer defending Samuel L. Jackson's character in one of my all time favorite Courtroom Drama Films, A Time to Kill.  But it's plain to see that while Animation was getting the strict attention to detail from everyone of the higher ups at Disney, the live action films were basically set to go on auto pilot.  

Beyond the hokey acting, the film also has a strange obsession with slapstick humor.  Look, I get it.  It was the mid 1990s and Home Alone was still a big deal, but the film spent less time on more snarky one liners and used most of it's humor for a handful of gags involving comedic Three Stooges levels of injuries, from crotch shots, to teeth getting knocked out and the works.  You can basically see all the best slapstick jokes in the trailer for the film, so unfortunately the film is rather humorless without those moments of hijinks.  

What's Good?: While the film is more reliant on slapstick humor than anything, I have to give credit where it's due and say that some of the one liners in this movie are flat out hilarious.  I don't understand how this movie hasn't been made into a meme, yet.  Like, there are so many moments, from Knox's railing against the players at the beginning of the game, the angry toothless Angel fan and basically any word that comes out of Ranch Wilder's mouth.  This movie had a fairly strong comedic dialogue that gets overlooked thanks to the slapstick.  This movie has a lot in common with another movie in Heavyweights, which is such a meme worthy film in it's own right, that I think I need to look back at it again soon.  Both films have decent writing, but fall flat in the slapstick department.  A pity, too.  

Overall: Well, for all this film's fault's, it is unapologetic about what it is and who it was trying to appeal to.  It's a kids movie, with a lot of heart.  It isn't for people who were passionate about learning the game of baseball.  If you wanted to learn that, you should watch Ken Burns's Baseball documentary.  It's a lighthearted kids movie that you could have taken your kids to instead of seeing The Lion King for the 100th time (yes my fellow Millennials, our favorite film of all time was considered the Frozen of it's day).  And in my follow through viewing of this movie, I can live with it.  It's not complex or truly engaging, but it's a fairly decent movie that I think people should take another look at some time down the line.