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Mr. Baseball
R1 - America - Universal Pictures Review written by and copyright: James-Masaki Ryan (3rd April 2015). |
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The Film
 "Mr. Baseball (1992) An aging New York Yankees player Jack Elliot (played by Tom Selleck) is losing his edge. Infamous for being a playboy with the ladies and getting into local trouble, he is also becoming infamous as a has-been. A homerun hitter in his prime, but his batting average has fallen below .300. The Yankees trade him to the only team that was willing to take: The Chunichi Dragons of Nagoya, Japan. Although reluctant to go, Jack travels to Nagoya and must immediately meet the owners of the team and give a press conference at the airport, with the team’s English interpreter Yoji (played by Toshi Shioya) helping to translate, although he doesn’t exactly interpret the unappreciative and sarcastic words by Jack. In a scene later inspired by “Lost in Translation”, Jack watches a dubbed rerun of “Knight Rider” on TV while contemplating about his loneliness in a foreign country. At the first day of practice, Jack meets an American player nicknamed “Hammer” (played by Dennis Haysbert) who’s been with the Dragons for 5 years and quite used to the Japanese lifestyle. He also meets the intimidating and strict coach of the Dragons, Uchiyama (played by Ken Takakura) who everyone reveres, as he was the Japanese homerun champion years ago with a record still unbroken. Jack makes a boatload of mistakes culturally, by not taking off his shoes indoors, by getting in a communal bathtub before showering, and even smoking on a train. Although with the smoking, it’s because he doesn’t give a damn through his frustration. Not just with the culture, but Jack also takes out his frustrations on coach Uchiyama, disregarding his rules, his advice, and even his orders during a game. Jack meets Hiroko (played by Aya Takanashi) who works in advertising and must work with Jack doing silly commercials, but at the same time she is making him feel comfortable and gives him a better understanding of the culture. She has an immediate attraction to him, although Jack is at first reluctant of having a relationship, he falls for her and the two become a couple. But with all the trouble he has, will he ever get used to Japan? Will Jack ever get his baseball mojo back? Or will he wither away in baseball has-been oblivion? “Mr. Baseball” was a Japanese-American co-production, with the actual Chunichi Dragons baseball team helping with production, with many actual baseball players making cameo appearances. Tom Selleck was already a very well-known name in the industry with his work on the “Magnum P.I.” TV series, and also branching into film with “Three Men and a Baby”, “Quigley Down Under”, and “Three Men and a Little Lady”. In Japan, Ken Takakura was one of the most popular actors of the 1970’s in tough guy action films, and one of the most respected actors of the 1980’s. With his English speaking roles in Sydney Pollack’s “The Yakuza” (1974) and Ridley Scott’s “Black Rain” (1989), his name and face was already familiar to international audiences as well. With a budget of $40 million coming from both sides of the Atlantic, it still stands as one of the most expensive Japanese-American co-productions. In an unusual choice, the film was directed by Australian director Fred Schepisi, known for the controversial film “The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith” (1978), the underseen western “Barbarosa” (1982) starring Willie Nelson, and the critically acclaimed dramas starring Meryl Streep, “Plenty” (1985) and “Evil Angels” (1988). Not necessarily known for comedy, Schepisi was the director of the commercially and critically successful comedy “Roxanne” (1987) starring Steve Martin, and inadvertently “Evil Angels”, also known by the International title "A Cry in the Dark" became infamously known for the third season “Seinfeld” episode referencing the crucial and emotional “The dingo ate my baby” scene as pure comedy years later. With “Mr. Baseball” being a comedy film about generational and cultural differences, Schepisi was eager to add more humor to the film than was already there. Although the final script approval was by Selleck and Universal Pictures, who were not interested in Schepisi’s ideas for rewrites. What was released was a conventional comedy film with easy laughs and a predictable storyline. Selleck is actually quite fun to watch as a foreigner stuck in Japan. Like the aforementioned “Lost in Translation”, there are quite a lot of similarities between Bill Harris and Jack Elliot. Both are stuck in Japan for a period of time, both are has-beens in America but big in Japan in popularity and in stature, and both are having a midlife crisis. Unlike the character of Bill Harris, the character of Jack Elliot is much more physical and talkative in taking out his frustrations. He frequently breaks things and complains intensely like a frustrated man-child, yet he is very likable objectively. The character change from the halfway point is well done, not going too overboard with his interest in actually trying to improve himself through willpower and also physical conditioning through trust and acceptance. Takakura’s character is like a continuation of the inspector in “Black Rain”: an uptight man with a post-war traditional upbringing, yet with the American in town starts to change his serious attitude bit by bit. It’s been said that in the movie “Black Rain”, during the karaoke scene it was the first time Takakura laughed and smiled in a movie. With “Mr. Baseball” being his 200th movie appearance, that’s quite a feat. (Although I can’t say for certain if it’s true or not since I have not seen all 200 of his performances.) Takakura does something quite rare for Japanese actors speaking English in a movie: he sounds genuine. When he speaks, he sounds quite natural as a second-language speaker in cadence and also with his occasional natural mistakes. Ken Watanabe is one of the only other Japanese actors that sound like they speak learned English as opposed to forced rehearsed English. For some examples of forced rehearsed English just listen to Hideaki Ito as an English teacher in Takashi Miike’s “Lesson of Evil” (2012) or Toshiyuki Nishida in “Emperor” (2012), which they both sound unconvincing as English speakers and more like they are reading cue cards with perfect grammar and terrible pronunciation. Takakura died in 2014 at the age of 83, which was coincidentally the uniform number he wore as the coach of the Dragons in “Mr. Baseball”. The minor characters are manageably good. Dennis Haysbert’s character of “Hammer” is not on screen enough but makes a memorable appearance as an initial guide into the world of Japan and Japanese baseball. Since his fame has risen, his face is now prominent on the DVD case, even though he was not featured on the original poster. Jack’s love interests Hiroko played by Aya Takanashi unfortunately suffers from the “forced rehearsed English” way of speaking, making her character a little less serious to take. Her character is one that is hard to understand the emotional arc, as we have to wonder why she falls in love with such a man-child like Jack and also doesn’t tell him about her relation to the Dragons, which is a major plot spoiler. Maybe she just has a thing for hairy chests and thick mustaches. Takanashi has completely disappeared from the industry, appearing in a few pieces in the 90’s, and nothing since then. Toshi Shioya who played Yoji is occasionally the comic relief with his translations. Shioya was a prominent figure in the world of Japanese television although not necessarily a household name, but unfortunately he died of an aortic dissection in 2013 at the age of 56. For anyone that has moved to another country will know much of what Jack goes through, and especially people who moved to Japan will get a kick out of much of the humorous cultural mistake scenes sprinkled throughout the movie. But not just that, there are many scenes that also explain about Japanese culture very well. For people who are planning to move to or visit Japan, the movie comes as recommended viewing for learning about some basic Japanese etiquette. But even with big names attached and playing everything safe, the movie was not a financial success. It was to be released first in Japan during the 1992 baseball season, but because the Chunichi Dragons in real life had one of their worst seasons ever with their team ranking dead last, the movie was shelved until the beginning of 1993 just before the baseball season started. It seemed to pay off as the Dragons made it to second place in the league that year, although it was not a huge hit with audiences, not even cracking the top 20 films of the year in Japan. In the United States it was released in 1992 as scheduled, but only made back half of its production costs in gross. A disappointment overall, but the film eventually found an audience on cable, video, and especially with expats and/or baseball fans in Japan, who all have related to many of the humorous scenes in the film.
Video
In the early days of DVD, Universal licensed out “Mr. Baseball” to Goodtimes Home Video, which they released a barebones DVD with a non-anamorphic picture. In 2003, Universal released their own edition, which is the one being reviewed here. The Universal DVD is framed at 2.35:1, and unlike the older Goodtimes DVD, is anamorphically enhanced and the picture looks fine. The print used is stable and clean, with no major film damage or other problems to be seen. Being an early 90’s film in which colors just didn’t stand out at all, it looks pretty bland most of the time. Not much to complain about but it could look much better with an HD remaster.
Audio
English/Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0 surround There is no 5.1 bump on this release, only the original 2.0 surround track, which sounds fine and gets the job done. Dialogue is centered while the music score and incidental music is spread toward the sides. Jerry Goldsmith’s score, which many consider to be one of his worst with the post-80’s synth sounds, is clear, but not very memorable. The dialogue is in a mix of English and Japanese. During the Japanese dialogue, there are burned-in theatrical English subtitles. Optional English HoH, French, and Spanish subtitles are available. There is also a French dub/Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0 surround track. For the French dub, the Japanese scenes are left in Japanese while the English dialogue is dubbed in French. What Universal left out were French subtitles for the Japanese scenes. If you turn on the French subtitles, they are for the entire film, including the Japanese scenes, and are a translation of the English dialogue rather than captions for the French dub. Another note, if Universal ever goes to release this on Blu-ray, I hope they re-do the Japanese translation subtitles. There is one particular instance where the wrong subtitle sentence appears. Around the 20 minute mark Yoji's comment is translated as "Oh no, my aching back!" when he really is saying "The ball is flying well", this is an error since a few minutes later in the locker room, a player actually says and is subtitled "Oh no, my aching back!". Copy and paste error, it seems. I also found once where a character's name is spelled incorrectly.
Extras
The first extra is one of the more baffling choices I’ve seen for a bonus feature: “Fancy Curves” 1932 short film starring Babe Ruth (8:37) This short film starring Babe Ruth as himself is an interestingly and seemingly sexist short, of Ruth teaching a group of young ladies with long legs how to play baseball. Besides the baseball angle, what does it have to do with “Mr. Baseball”? Absolutely nothing. This would have been more appropriate as a bonus feature on Universal’s DVD of “The Babe” (1992), which that DVD has two other Babe Ruth shorts on it. Theatrical Trailer (2:18) The PG-13 Theatrical Trailer is in 1.33:1, which shows how much of the frame is lost by cropping. Interestingly there are a few lines of jokes in the trailer that are not included in the finished film.
Overall
“Mr. Baseball” is not a terribly bad film that critical ratings give, but it is not a masterpiece either. It follows convention too much and treads on a safe trail. But as a fun film about cultural differences and Japanese culture in general, it works. I would have liked to see a special edition with thoughts by the cast and crew, the alternate ideas Schepisi had, difficulties shooting in Japan, and interviews with foreign players in Japan (which these days there are a lot of) would be nice, but I know that won’t be coming anytime soon, sadly. Why a review of a DVD edition 12 years after it was released? Because I couldn’t find any major reviews of the 2003 DVD and got interested in it again when I found out a Blu-ray was released in Germany recently. Universal, where’s a U.S. release?
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