{"id":22484,"date":"2013-04-15T09:04:05","date_gmt":"2013-04-15T13:04:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/?p=22484"},"modified":"2013-04-15T09:04:05","modified_gmt":"2013-04-15T13:04:05","slug":"42","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/2013\/04\/42\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201c42\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Bob Garver<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Too many weeks ago, I proclaimed \u201cJack the Giant Slayer\u201d to be the first half-decent movie of 2013. Now along comes \u201c42\u201d, and I am proclaiming it to be the first really good movie of 2013. It should not have taken us over three months to get the first really good movie of 2013 (even with my understanding that the post-holiday season is a dumping ground for the studios\u2019 garbage releases), but that shouldn\u2019t diminish the achievements of \u201c42\u201d as an admirable sports film.<\/p>\n

The film tells the story of pioneering African-American baseball player Jackie Robinson (Chadwick Boseman) and his heroic seasons with the 1946 Montreal Royals and of course the 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers. Robinson encounters racism wherever he goes, whether it be from locals from the towns he visits to representatives of opposing teams to his own teammates. He\u2019s usually stoic enough not to rebuff the bigots, but he does prove that he belongs in the major leagues by playing great baseball.<\/p>\n

Not that Robinson doesn\u2019t have his supporters. There\u2019s his wife Rachel (Nicole Beharie) and his reporter friend Wendell (Andre Holland). Then there\u2019s Dodgers General Manager Branch Rickey (Harrison Ford), the man who took the all-important first step in signing an African-American player. As Rickey, Ford gives his best performance in a long time, maybe the best of his career. He puts enough phlegm into every line to make for instantly memorable quotes. There\u2019s a reason why his voice dominates all the film\u2019s advertisements.<\/p>\n

The film is filled with inspirational moments on and off the field. The ones off the field are fine (and often provide the film with some much-needed comic relief), but it\u2019s the ones on the field that you\u2019re paying to see. It\u2019s not that they go unexpectedly; in fact there will be many who say they\u2019re clich\u00e9, but they\u2019re about as wonderful as they are in all the great baseball movies. I guess you can never go wrong with those exciting scenes where the hero has everything on the line, they make an amazing play and the crowd goes wild.<\/p>\n

The film has its flaws. It is, of course, based on a true story, but I seriously doubt that the true story was this sappy. It seems too often that scenes are constructed to elicit an emotional response and they don\u2019t seem natural. There are also too many unnecessary subplots bouncing around. Particularly distracting is one involving outspoken Dodgers manager Leo Durocher (Christopher Meloni), an affair, a scandal, and the quest to replace him. The spot is filled with a nice enough guy, but he barely appears for the rest of the movie and the storyline essentially has no payoff.<\/p>\n

Since there was a ridiculous controversy over this issue with \u201cDjango Unchained\u201d a few months ago, I feel the need to report that the film is filled with racial epithets, including the \u201cN-word\u201d. I don\u2019t see how the film could not have these words, given their historical context and how essential racism is to the plot. You\u2019ll likely feel uncomfortable, but the point is to make you feel that way so you can empathize with Robinson. Still, if you or your family can\u2019t handle hate speech, then this is definitely not the film for you because there\u2019s a lot of it.<\/p>\n

\u201c42\u201d is an exemplary baseball movie that doubles as an exemplary historical movie. The performances and technical details are all top-notch. In fact, I wouldn\u2019t rule out the possibility of Oscar nominations for Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford. It is easily the best film of the year so far, not that the competition was all that stiff. By all means you should support this film so Hollywood can get back to really trying again.<\/p>\n

Three and a Half Stars out of Five.<\/p>\n

\u201c42\u201d is rated PG-13 for thematic elements including language. Its running time is 128 minutes.<\/p>\n

Contact Bob Garver at rrg251@nyu.edu<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Bob Garver   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Too many weeks ago, I proclaimed \u201cJack the Giant Slayer\u201d to be the first half-decent movie of 2013. Now along comes \u201c42\u201d, and I am… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22484"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22484\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}