my long awaited review of fever pitch part 1

the primary problem with fever pitch is that it does not work on any level.

first, it does not work as a baseball movie. as most of us have experienced personally, and even more of us vicariously, a baseball field is a beautiful and often magical place. if you ask any true baseball fan, they can tell you about the first time they exited the tunnel at yankee stadium and saw the deep green expanse of left center, walked up to bush stadium and viewed the arch inspired facade or wound their way up to the upper deck of royals stadium, where they were greeted with a magnificent view of the fountains (not to mention I-40 I-70. thanks uncle cade!). unfortunately the cinematography of fever pitch fails to convey either the physical beauty of the field or the lyrical beauty of a perfect wind-up or the sweet moves of a short stop turning two. the stock footage of the games is decent enough, but the shots that the farrelly's directed were horrible. i'm convinced that the blind imbecile who willingly purchased petey the bird could have made more of those shots. in true fenway fashion i would have to say, cinematographer, cinamatographhhher, cinamatogrepherrrrrrrrrrrrr....you suck! furthermore, the portrayals of the fenway faithful were utterly unbelievable. i've been to fenway and have sat close to where the quirky, irrepressible fans sit, so i can assure you that their dialogue is not pg-13 material. i have heard profanities at fenway that i never knew existed and the hometown faithful have made me blush more times than i can count. fans at fenway do not fail to use the f-bomb, they do not talk about "the curse" (they leave such ignorant talk to mindless muckrakers such as Shaughnessy) and they do not fail to discuss subtle nuances of the game, such as whether a one out sacrifice is mathematically sensible or whether lefty-lefty pitching substitutions make an ounce of sense. the fans at fenway, and i'm talking about the real fans--not the beachball pounding, wave joining, blathering idiots who populate the dunkin dugout environs of the bleachers--know baseball better than any fans in the world. when i am there, i am proud to be one of them. turning them into jibber-jabbing, non-cursing, conga-line dancing idiots is reprehensible. on second thought, its worse that that...it's filthy! finally, it does not work as a baseball movie because the narrative ark of the season is never in doubt (hence, no suspense whatsoever) and the filmmakers profane the game by subliminating the story of the season to an idiotic, insipid romance. if you're going to make a baseball movie, make a baseball movie. the narrative arc of the baseball season can sustain a love story here and there (think jake taylor and his sexy librarian, crash and his nun of the "church of baseball"), but do not subliminate the baseball to some player or fan's affection for some broad. okay, i need to get to work. more to come...