Moneyball(2011)“Moneyball,” based on the controversial non-fiction Baseball novel by Michael Lewis, follows the revolutionary tactics Oakland Athletics General Manager Billy Beane (Brad Pitt) implemented to create a winning team on a modest budget. Defying the tradition of Baseball’s antiquated recruiting methods; Beane’s story transcends the design of the diamond field. “MoneyBall” is evidence that even in the oldest of American games, the incorporation of the new can still come out on top.
Beane, the quick-draw mastermind of the small market A’s, feels the pressure from the team’s owner to assemble a championship-caliber team with the salary cap of roughly 40 million dollars. In Major League Baseball terms, that seemingly hefty amount is worth a box of Cracker Jack's compared to the over 100 million dollars elite teams like the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox get to splurge on star players.
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Lookout films presents I Knew It Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale
John Cazale is one of the most overlooked actors in film history. Cazale, who played rhythm to co-stars Robert De Niro and Al Pacino groundbreaking lead acting riffs not only held his own, but was able to do what few supporting actors can, be dynamic without being overpowering. He was only in five films before his life ended prematurely at 42 due to bone cancer, but what films: “The Godfather”, “The Godfather II”, “Dog Day Afternoon”, “The Conversation” and “The Deer Hunter.”
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Twister (1996)
Mysteriously-funded and irrationally-driven "storm-chasers" gad about the American midwest, trying to throw an aluminum thingy filled with little aluminum thingies into a tornado. They say it's to research these natural disasters. Cue joke about this movie being natural disaster. Leading the pants-wetting charge is Jo (Helen Hunt) with her team of nonces, including a young, beatnik Philip Seymour Hoffman. Along for the sodden ride is Jo's estranged hubbie and ex-leader of the nonces, Bill (Bill Paxton), with his new psychologist boo, played with closed-kneed stoicism by Jami Gertz; with the talented Cary Elwes as a rival storm-chaser, relegated to Dick Dastardly sniggers. |
