After the success of Slumdog Millionaire, there was bound to be a more mainstream India-centric film, so what better studio to make it than Disney? Like that film, Million Dollar Arm sticks close to the streets, gazing at India from the ground level, taking in its life, movements, colors and textures. It uses Indian music to enhance the visuals, and it takes the care to show off the beauties of the country like the Taj Mahal, and it even ends, just like Slumdog, with a feel-good musical montage unrelated to the rest of the movie as the credits roll. But India's poverty too, is realistically portrayed, as well as its nightmarish bureaucracy and the ever-honking vehicles that clog its cities.
A case study in extremities, particularly in its smells, says J.B, the film's main character. But, unlike India, Million Dollar Arm remains squarely rooted in the middle of the road, never less than good but not groundbreaking or innovative enough to be excellent. As expected from Disney, the movie tells the safe story of the workaholic jerk in need of redemption; the perfect setup for a heart-tugging climax. We all know the story. In a desperate financial situation, sports agent J.B turns to an investor who will fund his crazy plan to save his business. He will travel to India to find the MLB’s first Indian players. There, he eventually finds Rinku and Dinesh, two talented athletes who have never thrown a baseball (you can see the tragic/comedic potential already) but who can be (and will be after many difficulties) trained to be baseball pitchers.
A more daring movie would have focused on the struggles which faced these kids who had never left their hometowns before going on to join an MLB team, the first athletes of their country to play for any professional sports league. The movie does show their unfamiliarity with their new home and how it affects them. There’s a poignant scene in which Rinku calls his family from his new home in LA, but he can barely express his frustration, thinking that he ought to be grateful for his opportunity instead of complaining about it. He simply hangs up with the excuse that he has to go to work. This little scene and others like it provide enough evidence that this could have been a truly special movie, but no matter. The film follows the formula to the letter, never deviating for one second, but it does so perfectly. The fish out of water situation is used not to explore cultural differences, but for jokes. One of the players falls in love with pizza while the other can’t stop fooling around with the automatic elevator door, and their translator gets drunk on punch. They laughs are cheap, and maybe they ought to be more troubling. As Drew McWeeny points out in his review, three Indian adults should know what pizza is, how an elevator works, and if a drink has alcohol in it. But I found them funny nonetheless. Despite myself, with a tinge of recognition, I just kept laughing at the situations these poor guys were in.
But its not all fun and games. In a film of this kind, there must be a redeeming force that pushes our hero past his narcissistic phase. You see, Rinku and Dinesh are risky investments, J.B’s last choice. His primary concern is Popo — a football player as imbecilic as his name — the big fish that can bring in a lot of business and a lot of money to J.B. So while he’s preoccupied with Popo, he abandons Dinesh, Rinku and their translator Amit.
It’a a recipe for disaster, but this is a Disney movie, so in comes Brenda (Lake Bell) with her girl next door good looks, impossibly radiant smile and strong but charming personality. Brenda —who’s J.B’s tenant and so perfectly fulfills the girl next door paradigm — has always liked J.B, taking any opportunity she could to talk to him before his three Indian visitors came around and later befriending the three of them. She has the ideal vantage point to see how J.B’s behavior has been affecting them, particularly the two pitchers who look up to him as their saviour and need him to be more present in their lives. Thankfully, Lake Bell injects the character with her usual strong will and bizarre sense of humor ("I always wanted a mini Taj!"), in the process creating a character central to the story, one who’s unafraid to call J.B on his BS and will not settle for just hanging out on the sidelines, as many heroines often do.
Miss Brenda, as the Indians call her, could use her own movie as much as Rinku and Dinesh, but the possibility of a movie that could have been does not in any way diminish the movie that is. Jon Hamm has the makings of an A-class movie star, and Million Dollar Arm serves only to solidify his standing. He takes a standard character in a typical story and makes him into an actual person through several, expressive, closeups that show the desperation of a decent man and the pitch-perfect line readings that make us see the decent man beneath that desperation. He can also deliver hilarious deadpan stares like no one else, proving that he can play the comedy as well as the drama (see this scene from Mad Men).
Anyway, after Brenda tells him of the terrible pressure the pitchers-in-training are in, and after he sees them fail spectacularly in front of several MLB scouts, he is finally able to open his eyes. He apologizes, listens to their troubles, shares a homemade Indian meal with them, and he even accompanies them in prayer to demonstrate his solidarity. After that, he miraculously assembles enough people for a second tryout, and, well, if you are vaguely familiar with Disney or baseball, then you know what happens next, as this is a true story.
Coming in, I knew everything that would happen, but I wouldn’t hesitate to call this a good movie, verging on great. Hamm and Bell are a revelation, and so are Suraj Sharma (Rinku) and Madhur Mitta (Dinesh). Alan Arkin and Aasif Mandvi also show up as their usual funny selves. Arkin plays a retired scout who helps J.B find the pitchers. He’s old and wise, so J.B has to learn to listen to him; plus, he doesn’t need to see any of the pitches because he can hear their speeds, a gift that makes him seem even wiser and stranger than he already is. Mandvi meanwhile plays the best friend/coworker who knows how screwed up J.B is, but is too close to the situation to do anything about it. So he’s used for comedy, mainly for complaining that none of his new Indian friends are fans of Cricket, one of his favorite sports. Director Craig Gillespie beautifully photographs not only India, but the field and the pitchers as well. Baseball’s a beautiful sport, and an excellent subject for movies. Gillespie knows it and takes full advantage of it. But I’m getting sidetracked. I saw the potential of a great movie about two Indian immigrants, and the problematic nature of yet another white-savior narrative. I saw the great Disney wheels turning smoothly to release yet another feel-good movie. I saw the manipulative strings of the perfectly constructed story pulling at my heart. And I could’t resist any of it. I saw it all coming, but it hit me anyway. Maybe I’m a sucker, but at least I’m happy.
Verdict- 3/4
Million Dollar Arm (2014) 2h 5min. PG.
Random Thoughts
- Watching people eat pizza onscreen makes me hungry for pizza. Maybe Rinku in real life is more knowledgable than his counterpart in the film, but coming from a similar situation as him, the availability of pizza in the U.S continues to astound me years after that first delivery.
- I always knew that Alan Arkin had superpowers.
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