Trouble with the Curve

The Anti-"Moneyball"

Gus Lobel (Clint Eastwood) is an aging baseball scout who resists changing trends in his business, specifically the use of computers and mathematical statistics as one of the largest factors in choosing your new recruits. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to not think of last year's brilliant Moneyball, a film that made heroes of the two guys who used that method to great success. In that film, Gus would be one of those scouts that told Billy Beane it was all "fortune cookie wisdom." Is Trouble with the Curve aspiring to be a rebuke to Moneyball? I'm not sure, though part of me doubts it. I suspect this was written before Moneyball was ever released, though it didn't start filming until this year, so somebody would have noticed. Certainly it is some kind of statement on the current state of baseball scouting, but I can't say I know much about that business.

I'm trying to remember the first time I saw Clint Eastwood in a film. It may have been In the Line of Fire, the last film before this one that he acted in but did not direct. Or perhaps it was A Perfect World, a film that he did direct. I'm not sure, but whatever film it was, I've been a fan of his ever since, despite the fact that for the past decade every performance of his has hinged on the grumpy old curmudgeon character. Trouble with the Curve offers nothing new in that respect, though it does pair him with a younger, more upbeat sidekick in the form of Mickey (Amy Adams), his daughter. Maybe "upbeat" isn't the proper word, though. She is Gus's daughter, after all - a workaholic, career-driven woman with major issues from her childhood. She and Gus aren't close, due in no small part to Gus's seeming inability to emote.

The acting here is fine all around; Eastwood is excellent, though playing the same character he has been. Amy Adams, who gave one of the year's finest supporting turns in The Master is likewise great. Other characters played by Justin Timberlake, John Goodman (who, between this, Argo, and Flight, has had a great year), and Matthew Lilliard are well-acted and convincing.

Less convincing, however, is the screenplay by Randy Brown. The pieces are all there - the motivations, agendas, and backstories - but they just fall together too nicely. Especially in the film's third act, which conveniently pushes aside many of the tribulations of the characters in an attempt to exact some type of catharsis. Unfortunately, too many of the plot's developments, particularly in its final moments, are predictable fifteen minutes before they occur. In the hands of lesser actors this film, spinning a predictable yarn of a story, would be unbearable; it is only these actors that keep it afloat and entertaining, which it is.

Trouble with the Curve is ultimately an expertly acted piece of mediocrity. It suffers greatly from comparisons to the far superior Moneyball, not only in its story, but in style and substance. When the inevitable use of slow-motion pitching arrives, I couldn't help but be amazed at how much more effectively it was used in Moneyball. So many such minor details become entrenched with comparisons between the two films, and Trouble with the Curve suffers every time.

2.5/4