The Sandlot

I almost daresay this is a summer movie, but why?

Well The Sandlot, to my knowledge was the first sports movie I ever saw. Before I even knew half the rules of baseball or even played it myself, I watched The Sandlot. And The Beast frightened me. Yeah, that dog freaked me the hell out when I was young! To the point where I did not want to watch the movie, but now when you see him (in not animatronic form) he looks ridiculously cute, like I would totally get this dog! But if someone told me Darth Vader showed up at the end, I could have pushed through. But anyway, many people consider it to be one of the best sports movies of all time, certainly the most beloved, although and this is surprising even to me, the movie is not really about the sport of baseball but a small group of kids who play it. They play it a lot, even go against a rival team once and yet I hesitate to fully define it as a sports movie. It's more a summer movie to me. So what's the story? A young kid who just recently moved to a new town meets with a group of kids who play baseball every day of the summer, and we are told of this story through his own eyes all grown up. He makes friends with them all, learns to play better at baseball, and just enjoys his time with his friends. And I think that's what makes it more sort of accesible, and more fun for people including young kids to watch. Because it's not about the sport, they don't throw in terminology or lines that only hardcore baseball fans would know. Anyone with a passing interest or knowledge can enjoy this movie. It's more about the young boys than the sport. And that's what makes me say it's not really a sport movie like say, Friday Night Lights or Major League. And the problem is I don't watch sports movies hardly ever, it takes a lot to get me interested in watching one, but with this I feel like I could pop it in anytime and enjoy it, in fact...I do! It's a fun, really good movie with memorable characters, funny scenes, it just has this fun, care free sort of feel to it, and holds the most cuss words I have ever heard in a G rated film! I mean damn kids. I just really like this movie, and for those of you who do classify this as a sports movie, it's definitely my second favorite, next to Rocky. Probably because it defies every single sports movie trope, and for those of you who do not know anything about sports or don't watch sports movies you're in luck. I have a supplemental sort of review-esque video where one of my favorite critics dissect why people watch sports movies. It's not too in depth, in fact it's more of a brief overview of various movie tropes of sports films so you don't have to worry about it dragging on. It's only about 10 minutes if memory serves correctly.

Here's the link: https://youtu.be/s9QdLt_3KCY

Well that's it for today, but tomorrow might hold something new in our midst.