Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		4.0

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 12, 2020

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel doesn’t shirk from the general perception that those of us with Jewish ancestry don’t always tend to be the most athletic folks in the world. This appealing documentary about Israel’s unlikely “Cinderella” story at the 2017 World Baseball Classic includes the hilarious bit from Airplane! where an elderly woman asks for some “light reading” on the flight and the helpful attendant hands her a (tiny one page) “leaflet” about Famous Jewish Sport Legends. There are of course famous Jewish sports legends, and as a “leftie” I grew up idolizing one of the more famous ones, Sandy Koufax. Koufax plays into this often rather unexpectedly emotional story since Koufax himself inspired many of the American Jewish baseball players who were recruited to be part of Israel’s team, since the World Baseball Classic allows for “heritage” players on various national teams (the doc describes another “national” team whose members were almost all not from that particular nation).

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel is that rare kind of documentary that may well appeal to those with not one whit of interest in its focal sport, baseball, since it's also a rather personal saga of several American Jews coming to terms with what the back cover of this disc states is their "tenuous" connection to Judaism, especially when the team travels to Israel on what amounts to a public relations campaign. The documentary is often surprisingly funny (how some of the team got recruited is especially comical at times), but it's also increasingly touching as these guys start to see the impact they're having on Israel as a whole, and particularly young starry eyed Israeli kids who dream of being on Team Israel themselves one day.

In that regard, the games actually sometimes "take the outfield" (so to speak), with brief montages delineating Team Israel's unlikely march through the tournament, which included a first place finish in Round 1 after Israel defeated all of its competitors. There are brief interstitial segments with several of the guys giving abbreviated biographies and also discussing some of the anti-Semitism they've experienced.

For those interested in this kind of "niche" of sports documentary combined with a "religious" subtext, there's a superb documentary entitled Jews and Baseball that some may find to be a perfect double feature with this piece (and there's a certain film clip in that piece that may seem familiar). (Jews and Baseball was edited by Amy Carey Linton, whom I interviewed several years ago with regard to her editing of Daughters of the Dust.)

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Menemsha Films and Kino Lorber with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Like many documentaries, this is cobbled together from a variety of different sources, and so there's a somewhat heterogeneous appearance some of the time. Most of the interview segments look sharp and well detailed, but there are occasional problems with noise (see screenshot 9 for one example, but a late night karaoke session in the film also is pretty splotchy looking). Some of the broadcast video can look a bit ragged when compared to the bulk of the piece. Detail levels are commendable on the whole, and the palette looks natural throughout.

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel offers DTS-HD Master Audio tracks in either 5.1 and 2.0. This is by and large a talking heads piece, with some interstitial game play, and as such the stereo track may suffice perfectly well for some. The surround track does open up the outdoor material pretty considerably, though, while also offering a more boisterous accounting of some of the whimsical music included. All of the talking head segments are delivered cleanly and clearly, and I noticed no problems whatsoever with regard to any issues like damage, distortion or dropouts.

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailers includes Heading Home (1080i; 2:22) along with several other releases by Menemsha Films.

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel is a really heartwarming and worthwhile documentary that perhaps unavoidably will appeal mostly to Jewish baseball fans, but which has a more universal "message" about how sports can help to unify an often fractured world, and how generational "inspiration" can be handed down. Technical merits are generally solid, and Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel comes Recommended.