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If you've never seen "Bull Durham" before, and are tempted to write it off as another sports flick, I beg you to rethink your position. Let me tell you my all-time favorite sports movie: "Hoop Dreams". What about it resonates with me so strongly? It's not a basketball movie --- instead, it is a character drama that just happens to exist within a basketball court. In other words, where the story takes place is irrelevant; what dominates the picture is how the story (or real-life events) affects the characters (documentary subjects).
"Bull Durham" might not belong in the realm of that classic, but skeptics shouldn't dismiss it simply because it involves baseball. Overlookers won't realize that it's a funny exploration of how people discover their own ambition; the dirt diamond & ball are circumstantial.
The story begins when a minor league team is joined by veteran catcher Crash Davis (Kevin Costner). Crash has been given the unenviable task of mentoring an...
BUll Durham remains a thoughtful baseball classic...
I recently saw Bull Durham for the first time, and I must admit, I was touched by something very profound within it, something that is of almost unspeakable power, a certain quality that only a few movies have: the ability to tell you something about yourself, something about all men, something about the world, and something about life, all at once.
Something About Yourself- I played baseball for six or seven years when I was younger, and it still remains my favorite game. I remember collecting cards, discussing the undefinable "potential" some rookies had and others did not, and reading scores of books on the subject. I had a child's lovely obsession with the game. This obsession also drove me to learn a painful lesson, when I was caught shoplifting baseball cards one summer day. Yet even this did not kill the dream. I remain in love with the game to this very day. Bull Durham reminded me of all this and more. It unlocked memories of baseball camp, of the boyhood...
Minor League Baseball Masterpiece
Ron Shelton spent some time in the minor leagues represented in his screenplay for Bull Durham, so he knows about the baseball things represented. But he also clearly has a gifted ear for the tempo of real life, and he knows about hopes and desires and the things that make human beings tick. The setting for this film with the minor league Durham Bulls works, and works perfectly, but the characters, especially among the central love triangle, could just as easily have been traveling salesmen or race drivers or con artists or gangsters.
Susan Sarandon plays Annie Savoy, a slightly older woman who is a Durham Bulls groupie of sorts: once a season she picks out a promising young player and begins an affair with them. During that season the promising young player has the year of his life and gets called up to the big leagues, leaving Annie to look for next year's promising young player.
The Bulls also have a million-dollar prospect of a pitcher with a right arm who the gods reached...
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