 "Photo: courtesy photo")
Sometimes we get too caught up in our daily lives. Sometimes we need to stop for a moment and reflect on our all-too-short, yet exciting childhoods in the early 1960s. We've all been there, and that's why Film Underground is going to help you along by playing the best kids' movie from 1993: the one, the eternal, "The Sandlot". Scotty Smalls wasn't very good at anything. When his mother told him he should make friends that summer of 1962, he was convinced it would be another long, boring, friendless one. He may have been embarrassingly bad at baseball, but his fascination and inept charm aided in his adoption by a ball playing gang of free-range neighborhood kids who come to accept him as a friend and teammate on their abandoned field affectionately named The Sandlot. He may not have known the infield fly rule or how to make a s'more, but Smalls is finally a part of something and it seems that nothing could go wrong. That is until one day, after a legendary hit sacrifices the team's last baseball, the kids are forced to call it a day. Hoping to keep the game going by getting a ball of his own, Smalls sneaks into the forbidden trophy case that belongs to his stepdad (Dennis Leary). It's an irreplaceable artifact set deeply in the heart of baseball lore, signed by none other than the Great Bambino himself, Babe Ruth. Unaware of its importance, the kids start up another game and send the ball over the fence, beyond which is a legendary dog of such ferocity and size that no home run or stray ball has ever returned from its clutches. They call the dog, simply, "The Beast." Of course, once Smalls realizes what he's done, he decides he has to get his Stepfather's ball back, and what follows is a heroic and hilarious mission filled with daring and misadventure. The crew will have to use all of their cunning to thwart "The Beast" and learn the secret of the mysterious old man (James Earl Jones) who takes care of it. "The Sandlot" did very well at the box office and has since been heralded for its original take on the coming-of-age flick. It's a sports movie, but what sets it above goofy kids' movies such as "The Big Green", "The Mighty Ducks", and the dozens or so movies in the "Airbud" franchise, is that it doesn't take a sports lover to enjoy the film. Sure, the baseball fans out there will appreciate the subtle references to Hank Aaron, the Red Sox, and baseball history, but the fantastic array of diverse characters that come together to form the sandlot team are what make the movie unforgettable. It has been regarded as one of the best of its kind and hit cult status in the late 1990s as it was immortalized in t-shirts and the affections of its adoring fans. Just like Babe Ruth tells us, "Heroes get remembered but legends never die." My sense is that this movie isn't going anywhere for a long, long time.
This Thursday, April 2 at 7:00 in MUB theater 1, abandon your paper, your job application or your otherwise dull and semi-adult projects to join us in watching this childhood nostalgia classic. Bring your own glove.
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