Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

For Love of the Game Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman September 13, 2017

Kevin Costner, one of Hollywood's most well-known actors but also one of the town's most ardent baseball fans, has starred in several films that take place on and around the revered diamond, two of which -- Field of Dreams and Bull Durham -- are unquestionable classics in the genre. Another is For Love of the Game, a movie that doesn't rank in the top handful of baseball films but, then again, it's not exactly a baseball movie. While it can certainly be a little banal and cheesy at times in the exploration of its dramatic and romantic elements, it's also a film that's a bit under-appreciated for its satisfying character study of a man who reflects on his life on what is not the biggest stage of his public career but certainly the most trying game of his life. The film, based on the posthumously published novel by Michael Shaara (the same man who wrote the high school history class staple The Killer Angels), offers a touching reflection on aging, love, and the pursuit of greatness, greatness not necessarily for fame and fortune but rather as a validation of lifelong pursuits.

Veteran Detroit Tigers pitcher Billy Chapel (Costner) has been a mainstay in the team's starting rotation for nearly two decades. He's been a World Series hero and it's only that he has yet to retire that's keeping him from Cooperstown. But his career is winding down. He's old and he has little left in the tank. His shoulder hurts and the team owner has just sold the club to a group of investors whose first action will be to trade Chapel, a lifelong Tiger, to the San Francisco Giants. He's scheduled to start an end-of-season road game against the vaunted New York Yankees, that team battling for a postseason position while Chapel's Tigers are simply playing out the schedule. Despite a bad shoulder and with nothing to lose, Chapel takes the hill, throwing to his longtime friend and catcher Gus Sunski (John C. Reilly), and as he records out after out on the mound, he reflects on his life, including his longtime romance with Jane Aubrey (Kelly Preston), all the while struggling with the very real possibly that this game could be his last.

For Love of the Game offers some interesting inside baseball -- here the term used literally -- in its exploration of a player's private life off the field, relationship with teammates and management, the psychology of life on the pitcher's mound, and the driving forces beyond pay and stats that keep a man in the game even when his body tells them it's time to quit. Sam Raimi's film offers some subtle commentary on the state of the game, about how baseball has become more about business than about winning and, perhaps more damning, the people who play and make the magic happen. The film makes Chapel's relationship with his catcher -- who is a "receiver" in more ways than one -- an integral cog in the story, and it more briefly, but no less touchingly and perhaps even profoundly, looks at how Chapel pitches to an old teammate and very close friend who has since moved on to the Yankees.

But the film isn't really about baseball. Not explicitly, anyway. Whether on the diamond or off, For Love of the Game is a quality human drama, a film about life'e experiences, distractions, physical and emotional pain, falling in love, losing friends, and coming to terms with time. Baseball serves as little more than a complimentary frame and an action with a number of life parallels. It's the life details, and the love story in particular, that are the real catalyst, the real battery, not pitcher and catcher. The film is packed with metaphors of how baseball reflects life, but the real beauty comes in how it is shown, often subtly, that baseball encompasses so much about life and how finely woven into the fabric of the game life off the field can be. Kevin Costner is wonderful in the lead role. It's easy to root for him, not simply for the history his character is making but rather for the man the actor shapes, the Billy Chapel who may be not be a perfect individual but who, on this day, may be perfect on the mound and, maybe, the story says, that perfection stems not from throwing mechanics, velocity, or how the stars align on any one particular day but from understanding and appreciating everything that's led to these would-be fateful nine innings.

For Love of the Game Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

If there is a sure thing in the Blu-ray business, it's picture quality inconsistency from Universal when it comes to the studio's catalogue output. For Love of the Game fortunately fares better than many, and while the 1080p transfer is certainly imperfect, it more often satisfies than it disappoints. The image is by-and-large pleasantly filmic, retaining a light and largely consistent grain structure while boasting quality textural stability. Faces are impressively complex in close-up, revealing pores and hair with ease. Baseball uniforms, jackets, and street attire all manage to satisfy with visibly complex lines and seams. Colors are pleasant. Tiger orange pops, Yankee blue and green grass are vibrant mainstays during the baseball sequences, and general coloring maintains a pleasant neutrality in other scenes, whether in hotel rooms or inside an airport. Black levels don't give much room to complain, and flesh tones appear accurate. This is an older master, however, and the image has the print pops and speckles to prove it, but even still, and with the crapshoot that is the Universal catalogue division, one that holds up this well is most welcome.

For Love of the Game Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

For Love of the Game's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack is, much like the video, highly satisfying but not exactly in the stratosphere of Blu-ray excellence. Music, from the opening titles forward, satisfies, delivering a pleasing, rich, full-bodied sound throughout the range and throughout the soundstage, from airy highs to modest lows. Positive spacing and light envelopment aid. The track offers plenty of pleasantly immersive din, whether screaming kids, passing traffic, and light breezes at an early Central Park scene or various reactions to Chapel's game inside the airport where Jane is kinda-sorta watching the game and kinda-sorta trying to get away from it. Crowd noise at Yankee Stadium isn't super raucous. There's definitely a loud and diverse buzz but the din is never as sonically overwhelming as it looks on the screen. There are some interesting pokes and prods and hints of sound and jeers when the stage goes nearly silent when Chapel "clears the mechanism" and tunes out all of the distractions around him, focusing only on what's in front of him at home place. Dialogue is clear and detailed, well prioritized and natural positioned in the front-center speaker.

For Love of the Game Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

For Love of the Game contains three extras, available only in-film via the pop-up menu.

• Spotlight on Location (480i, 19:38): Cast and crew discuss the script's strengths, story and character details, themes, and more.
• Deleted Scenes (480i, 21:36): About a dozen scenes presented one after another with no identifying title.
• Theatrical Trailer (480i, 2:30).

For Love of the Game Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

For Love of the Game staggers through some bland surface-level romance, but the larger picture is much more satisfying. Baseball is a prism through which the audience comes to know Billy Chapel, the man beyond the pitcher's mound. Through his quest to twirl the game of his life in what may very well be his last, and with a painful shoulder at that, he reminisces about the road that brought him to that mound on that day. The film explores a life imperfectly but well lived, a man who gives all he has not only for fame and personal glory but as a gift to the game he loves, standing for what is right with it and, more importantly, for the life he's lived. Universal's Blu-ray offers pleasant video and audio. A few extras are included. Recommended.