Rating summary

Movie		5.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		4.0

Baseball Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman July 12, 2021

This is the Blu-ray debut for 'Baseball.' Its supplemental follow-up, 'The Tenth Inning,' was previously released to Blu-ray in 2010. It, too, is included as part of this set.

Baseball's story is America's story. And in a world that is increasingly globalized and with the sport's popularity extended, and still extending, far and wide, it's also in many ways, now, the world's story. Through times of war and peace, prosperity and depression, segregation and integration, the sport's narrative closely reflects that of the world around it. Ken Burns' sublime documentary Baseball builds the paralleling stories from the sport's founding in the mid-1800s on through to today's stories of heroes and villains, of victors and the vanquished, and reveals how the "perfect game's" ebbs and flows on the field so closely parallel those that take place beyond the white lines. Though it is now a quarter-century old, Baseball remains the unquestioned, definitive look at the game's history and its place in, and parallels to, America's history.

Baseball brings the game's, and its native country's, story to life in a compelling series that weaves together a portrait of the pursuit of happiness, one pitch at a time. The series opens with a simple repository of everything baseball, exploring the games roots, heroes and legends, its greatest accomplishments and most damning failures, the pleasantries of the game, the dimensions of bat and ball, and the improbability of hitting the latter with the former. The national anthem plays and an image of children preparing to play ball sets the stage for the film’s extensive and exhaustive, but never excruciating or extracurricular, exploration of the men, culture, and world events that shaped the game and, in some ways, were shaped by the game. Burns’ documentary delivers hours of narrative poetry, fitting for a game that is unpredictable symmetry and poetry in motion. The film stirs the soul. It evokes broad emotions, national and personal, distant and intimate alike. It’s compelling yet relaxing, a masterstroke of a documentary that does not simply categorize and familiarize audiences with baseball’s history but also contextualizes it, finds the life within it, effortlessly exploring the beating heart of it. It tells a story of depth, progress, success, failure, ups, downs, and every relatable human emotion and historical construct imaginable. It’s a brilliant success of technical construction meets passionate remembrance and purposeful storytelling.

The following episodes are included. Summaries are courtesy of the Blu-ray packaging.

Disc One (Inning One):

• Our Game (1840s-1900) (1:53:54): By 1856, the game of baseball is already being called "the national pastime." But the nation is about to be torn apart. During the Civil War, there is one thing that Americans North and South have in common: baseball.

Disc Two (Inning Two):

• Something Like a War (1900-1910) (1:44:55): The 1900s are a decade of revolution. Byron Bancroft "Ban" Johnson takes over a struggling minor league and turns it into a financial success. In 1903, the first World Series is played between the Boston Pilgrims and the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Disc Three (Inning Three):

• The Faith of Fifty Million People (1910-1920) (1:58:34): A steady stream of immigrants land in America -- and find playing and following the National Pastime a path to becoming American. Even as the country endures a world war, baseball is trying to endure a decade that includes the angriest player to ever step foot on the field.

Disc Four (Inning Four):

• A National Heirloom (1920-1930) (1:55:00): The 1920s begin with America trying to recover from the war and baseball trying to recover from the scandal of the 1919 World Series. America finds relief in the Jazz Age. George Herman "Babe" Ruth is one of the best pitchers in baseball.

Disc Five (Inning Five):

• Shadow Ball (1930-1940) (2:04:01): In the midst of all the suffering of the Great Depression, baseball offers a welcome distraction -- and heroes. But the heroes do not come only from the Major Leagues. The Negro Leagues bring baseball to towns the Major Leagues ignore.

Disc Six (Inning Six):

• The National Pastime (1940-1950) (2:26:16): At the beginning of the decade, Jackie Robinson's debut is still years away. Joe DiMaggio sets a consecutive game-hitting streak that still stands. Ted Williams becomes the last man to hit .400. The Brookly Dodgers win their frist pennant.

Disc Seven (Inning Seven):

• The Capital of Baseball (1950-1960) (2:12:14): Year after year, the Yankees are on top of the American League. Year after year, the Giants and Dodgers fight for the National League crown. Starting in 1949, there is a New York team in the World Series for 10 straight years.

Disc Eight (Inning Eight):

• A Whole New Ballgame (1960-1970) (1:54:48): The 1960s are a turbulent decade for America. It is also a turbulent decade for baseball. It starts with Bill Mazeroski bringing down the Yankees with one dramatic home run, and in 1961, Roger Maris pursues Babe Ruth's "untouchable" record.

Disc Nine (Inning Nine):

• Home (1970-1980) (2:26:19): America and the world are seeing more changes than ever. And so is baseball. Free agency, multimillion-dollar salaries, the designated hitter, a shocking gambling scandal, a new home run champion, and a World Series victory for Canada.

Disc Ten (Inning Ten):

• Top of the Tenth (1992-1999) (1:57:33): In the age of globalization and deregulation, a cataclysmic strike over money and power brings baseball to the brink. Cal Ripken becomes baseball's new Iron Man, sluggers Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa smash records, and The Braves dominate the National League while the Yankees build a new dynasty. Meanwhile, players must make decisions about how far they are willing to go to succeed.

Disc Eleven (Inning Ten):

• Bottom of the Tenth (1999-2009) (2:05:10): In the fall of 2001, when a badly frightened country yearns for normalcy, baseball helps provide it. In an epic battle with the Yankees, the benighted Boston Red Sox stage the greatest comeback in history. Baseball is more popular and profitable than ever, but suspicions and revelations about performance enhancing drugs keep surfacing, calling the integrity of the game itself into question.

Baseball Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

PBS brings Baseball to Blu-ray with a newly remastered 1080p transfer that is gorgeously filmic and true to the film-sourced roots. There are, of course, almost countless examples of still photographs and vintage film footage of varying qualities; the older they are, the less clarity and stability and the more decay they reveal. The video score does not reflect these elements; age has taken a toll on vintage footage to be sure but there's a certain benefit the raggedness brings to the film, conveying a sense of time passed and distant history yet still vividly captured and presented within the sport's larger history. Rest assured, though, that the interview clips and other content filmed specifically for Baseball look terrific. There's a natural grain structure in play, evident in these scenes as well as atop old photographs, that give the picture that desirable film-quality appearance. The picture is inherently sharp with no appearance of artificial tampering at work. Colors are appropriately bold, certainly not so vivid as they may be for a Hollywood production but giving a warmth and depth to tones that are in evidence in interviews and shots of ballparks where natural greens are breathtakingly crisp and brilliant, for instance. Black levels are healthy; interviews are often conducted with severe shadows on one side of the face and in these examples black levels prove stable and shadow detail is superb. Within the film's natural constructs there's almost nothing to dislike; it's a winner.

Baseball Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Baseball features a pair of DTS-HD Master Audio lossless soundtracks, one each in the 5.1 and 2.0 channel configurations. Both are front heavy, the 2.0 track obviously for its lack of surround channel integration and the 5.1 for its relative adherence to the front end. Indeed, there are no serious and certainly no regularly occurring sojourns into the rear channels for this one. The big difference between the two is a fuller, more fluid sound field in 5.1. There's a feel for finer instrumental clarity and flow, even when considering merely the gentle piano score that is so prominent throughout the run. Dialogue positioning and fidelity are superior in the 5.1 presentation. The 2.0 track sounds a bit harder-edged and a little more booming. It lacks the 5.1 track's finesse. Dialogue is not quite as clear and precisely imaged in 2.0, either.

Baseball Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Baseball includes no supplements on discs one through nine but discs ten and eleven include the extras from the original The Tenth Inning Blu-ray release. See below for a listing of what's included and please click here for full coverage. Each disc does begin with an identical video montage set to a soothing piano rendition of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." It's a terrific intro, but it's not skippable.

This set ships in three standard Blu-ray cases, with discs one through six in the first case, discs seven through nine in the second, and discs ten and eleven in the third. The cases ship inside a non-embossed slip box. No DVD or digital copies are included with purchase.

Disc Ten:

• Back to the Ballpark: An Interview with Ken Burns and Lynn Nivick (2010) (1080i, 17:19).
• Additional Scenes (1080i, 35:27 total runtime): Included are Full of Knowledge, Dodgertown, A Tour of Fenway, A Night at Fenway, and Central Park .
• Interview Outtakes About the Era's Stars (1080i, 30:39 total runtime): Included are Greg Maddux, Pedro Martinez, Derek Jeter, Cal Ripken, Ichiro, David Ortiz, Barry Bonds, and Joe Torre.

Disc Eleven:

• Interview Outtakes: About the Era's Stars (1080i, 1:05:40 total runtime): Included are Hitting and Hitters, Pitching and Pitchers, Fielding, Red Sox and Yankees, Cubs, Giants, Affirmative Action Home Runs, Late 90s Power Surge, Home Run Chase of 1998, Asterisks and the Hall of Fame, Fame, The Flip, 9/11, Coming to America, Globalization, Ichiro on the WBC, Rotisserie, and Why We Love the Game.

Baseball Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

"The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game -- it's a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good, and it could be again." That's one of the most beautiful monologues in movie history, courtesy of James Earl Jones in Field of Dreams. It's also a perfect reflection of what Baseball is all about: the game, the world, the life around it, all intertwined and inexorably connected. There's a symbiosis in the parallelism which Burns captures in one of the most complex, yet also touchingly elegant and accessible, documentaries ever crafted. This new Blu-ray set is disappointingly absent any bonus content beyond that which was already released with the Tenth Inning set, but the newly remastered 1080p video and lossless soundtrack options are excellent. Baseball earns my highest recommendation.