The Last Movie I Saw

Have you ever played that game where you try to match current movie stars with their golden age counterparts? You know, like Tom Hanks is today's Jimmy Stewart (the goofy everyman), or Harrison Ford is Clark Gable (equally adept at adventure, comedy and romantic roles). Of course, it really doesn't work all that well because the biggest stars, almost by definition, are so unique that they defy any easy comparisons. I mean, as easy as it is to imagine Hanks doing quite well in a remake of Harvey, there's no way he could pull off the Stewart role in Winchester '73 (and by the same token there's no way I can imagine Stewart in Philadelphia). Of course every now and then a movie comes along and you're halfway convinced that you are watching an actor completely channel someone else. This was my experience watching Moneyball starring Brad Pitt in a performance that was practically indistinguishable from several given by Robert Redford at a similar point in his career (I'm thinking of Sneakers, Legal Eagles, and maybe especially Brubaker). I sure don't mean that as a knock on Pitt at all, who is a great actor in his own right. It's just that the resemblance was so striking that it threatened to overwhelm all the other estimable aspects of the film for me. For one director Bennett Miller and writers Steve Zaillian and Aaron Sorkin deserve an immense amount of credit for translating what I would have thought to be an unfilmable book into a truly engrossing moviegoing experience. Who would have thought that watching a baseball general manager construct a competitive team on a tight budget could be made so visually compelling? But they pull it off, aided not only by Pitt's fine performance as Oakland A's GM Billy Beane, but equally strong work from Jonah Hill (has he ever before undertaken a non-comedic role?) and Phillip Seymour Hoffman (though I have to say I remember the real Art Howe as a tall, slender figure, while Hoffman plays him short and dumpy-- but that's nitpicking). This is definitely one of the best movies I've seen in awhile, and a near perfect blend of Hollywood style and idiosyncratic material. I think it'll deserve to be mentioned alongside Bull Durham and Bang the Drum Slowly (now that I think of it, a film with much in common with Moneyball besides baseball) as great movies about the national pastime.