Moneyball (2011)

Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane's successful attempt to assemble a baseball team on a lean budget by employing computer-generated analysis to acquire new players.

Director:

Bennett Miller

Writers:

Steven Zaillian (screenplay), Aaron Sorkin (screenplay),

Stars:

Brad Pitt, Jonah Hill, Philip Seymour Hoffman

Nominated for 6 Oscars. Another 19 wins & 42 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Brad Pitt	...	Billy Beane
Jonah Hill	...	Peter Brand
Philip Seymour Hoffman	...	Art Howe
Robin Wright	...	Sharon
Chris Pratt	...	Scott Hatteberg
Stephen Bishop	...	David Justice
Reed Diamond	...	Mark Shapiro
Brent Jennings	...	Ron Washington
Ken Medlock	...	Grady Fuson
Tammy Blanchard	...	Elizabeth Hatteberg
Jack McGee	...	John Poloni
Vyto Ruginis	...	Pittaro
Nick Searcy	...	Matt Keough
Glenn Morshower	...	Ron Hopkins
Casey Bond	...	Chad Bradford

Storyline

Oakland A's GM Billy Beane is handicapped with the lowest salary constraint in baseball. If he ever wants to win the World Series, Billy must find a competitive advantage. Billy is about to turn baseball on its ear when he uses statistical data to analyze and place value on the players he picks for the team.

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Plot Keywords:

baseball | manager | one word title | slow motion | business | 

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Taglines:

What are you really worth?

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Genres:

Biography | Drama | Sport

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for some strong language

Details

Official Sites:

Sony Pictures [us]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

23 September 2011 (USA)

Also Known As:

El juego de la fortuna

Filming Locations:

Blair Field, Recreation Park - 4700 E. 10th Street, Long Beach, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$50,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

$19,501,302 (USA) (23 September 2011)

Gross:

$75,605,492 (USA) (27 January 2012)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Columbia Pictures, Scott Rudin Productions, Michael De Luca Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

133 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital Datasat SDDS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Billy Beane is portrayed as a lonely divorcée in the film, though in real life he had actually remarried. Scenes were actually shot with Kathryn Morris as his second wife, Tara, that didn't make the final cut (but can be seen as Blu-ray extras). However, Brad Pitt's character still wears a wedding ring throughout the film.

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Goofs

Two McFarlane action figures, one of Dennis Eckersley and one of Rollie Fingers, are visible on Art Howe's desk. These figures were not produced until 2008 and 2009, respectively.

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Quotes

Scout Barry: We're all told at some point in time that we can no longer play the children's game, we just don't... don't know when that's gonna be. Some of us are told at eighteen, some of us are told at forty, but we're all told.

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Connections

Referenced in How It Should Have Ended: Harry Potter and the Best Picture Summary (2012)

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Soundtracks

"Give Up The Funk (Tear The Roof Off The Sucker)"
Written by George Clinton (as George Clinton, Jr.), Bootsy Collins (as William Earl Collins), and Jerome Brailey
Performed by Parliament
Courtesy of The Island Def Jam Music Group
Under license from Universal Music Enterprises

User Reviews

A Baseball Movie That's Not About The Baseball

Surprisingly, this movie is less about the baseball game than the game of baseball. What is striking about this movie (and it's not about outs) is the raw audio sound technique used in this movie that is usually found in documentaries than feature films which helps make this movie come alive. There is a the ambiance of background sound and the echo that seems to resonate and bring the movie closer to the audience and present a much closer to realism experience. There isn't that much actual continuous footage of baseball in this movie, but rather the management of it. The heightened personal and emotional tension is carried throughout the movie and Director Bennett Miller has put together this compelling very intimate portrait of a man played by Brad Pitt and his statistician in an unusual angle of the game of baseball.

Somehow the almost overly brief snippets of scenes and background of current events and story are blended together along with poignant flashbacks will edited into some meaningful, main storyline without ever creating the idea of that the additional footage has someone been shortchanged. Bennett Miller apparently in his wisdom was able to capture the primary message of the movie, developed an accompanying background, and maintained the singular story around the entire movie, the art of carefully scriptwriting and editing.

Even without the formulaic all-American ending, Bennett Miller was able to wrap this movie into a complete feeling of wholeness for a feature film. Miller made excellent use of silence and editing choices in keeping the camera going just long enough for the more in-depth, substantive emotional impact of a scene to sink in. Miller seems to have brought a new found vision of a approach that brings a more connectiveness and meaningfulness to film-making, especially to interesting stories of reality that aren't even about the biggest and most momentous achievements of humanity and bringing them captivatingly to the big screen.