The film explores themes of redemption and the perception of value, the value we give to others and how this value is used to predict success. There is a "big game"
Brad Pitt to play Billy Beane, who in his youth was a baseball superstar potential, and now President of the economically straddled Oakland. Pitt gives a great performance and multi-dimensional Beane, who is one of the best role of his career so far. Pitt describes a man who had been injected in his youth and the failure of the victim was not able to live up to expectations and dreams that others had given him. As a former player, Billy Beane was not found in a typical general managers in baseball. Beane is described as chewing tobacco, a pragmatist who believes that he is right and everyone else is wrong.
The gap between rich and poor in baseball is more extensive than any other professional sport, with the Oakland resident in the lower end. As Billy says in the film: "There are teams of rich and poor teams there, then there is 50 feet of crap, then we are." In professional baseball, the rich teams can afford the best players and teams of the poor seem doomed to failure. As a small market team is headed for the 2002 season, Beane faces grim situation of having to deal with the loss of several of their star players have been poached by the big clubs ball market. With the limited funds available for it (the payroll of the second lowest in baseball), they can not take risks. Beane seeks new questions and ignore the old answers to survive.
Beane hiring an assistant to help do the job, Peter Brand (Jonah Hill), an intellectual, quantitative, Yale University economist educated. Mark has never played the game of baseball itself, but is capable of breaking down a mathematical equation. Mark serves as ammunition for sniper rifle Beane and together review the basics of how the game is structured, is contrary to decades of baseball convention wisdom.
Armed with a computer to perform statistical analysis, the goal is to find undervalued professional baseball players who have been largely abandoned to the unknown, or inappropriate for the major leagues. They are all victims of prejudice perceived physical appearance, disability, difficult to burn, or the greatest sin of sport, age. That most of these players have the ability to keep Beane so important, the ability to get on base.
The most important factor in their experiment is what is known as the base percentage (how many times a particular player is at the base). There is no clock in baseball, teams play until they win, and it is a numbers game. A game consists of nine innings, and the largest number is three. It takes three strikes to get out and three outs to end the inning. Until the third withdrawal of any given round is done, everything is possible. Anything that increases the chances of an exit to avoid. Bean noted that the percentage of base decreases the chance when a player in a database is not a withdrawal. Essentially, it's how their system works, which limits the possibilities for an exit.
Brand and Beane know the detailed aspects of the players (as a percentage of base) than the others do not subscribe. Compared to card counters at blackjack table, there is less risk to the game when you know that the cards played. Their new test methods to irritate the team scouts and old-school manager, Art Howe (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Tradition dictates that baseball is the work of explorers in search of potential talented ball club, not a computer. Having been at the other end stops scouts, ignoring the objections of Beane trying to find players that are the exact opposite of his younger self.
Besides the two is the son of Philip Seymour Hoffman and, as it often disappears in the role of Art Howe, senior director of baseball. Hoffman acts as an antagonist of the film, refuses to cooperate with Beane methods of play. Beane likes to control all aspects of the team, which includes features that Howe (Hoffman) believes that is best suited for. This leads to greater disagreement about how a team should run.
One of the funniest scenes of "Moneyball" Beane is a frugal shopper antics just before the trade deadline. In baseball, the trade deadline comes shortly after the middle of the season. If a team is doing well enough to consider a second phase, the buyers. By necessity, Beane is usually one or two steps ahead of other general managers in baseball. You can not always be the smartest person in the room, but it is certainly beating the shark in the tank. These qualities brilliantly Pitt appears on stage and listen to it (as Beane) and discuss complex business deals with other general managers is a bit like listening to a conversation spider to a fly.
Pitt's presence is essential for the success of the film, but it is not to say his presence makes the movie. The film adaptation of a book based on a frozen world, baseball is necessary, a list of the star to attract the general public, who can condemn the film as another sports movie. In addition to baseball related movies have little to no change outside the U.S., so having Brad Pitt as a star with the hope of an Oscar buzz can produce some foreign interest.
Among the many parallels between the development of "Moneyball" and the story is based on the distribution of Jonah Hill is the most obvious. An actor best known for his comic performances, Hill has been underestimated by his dramatic capabilities. Peter Hill's performance as the brand is simple and subtle as a character full of nervous energy and intelligence. For Hill, the transition from comedy to drama is transparent and allows the ideal boyfriend Brad Pitt for Billy Beane. In summary, the distribution of Jonah Hill was a move that should make you feel proud of Billy Beane.
It's hard to believe, to see the finished film, but "silver ball" was once considered a project in trouble. For a time, as Sony Pictures Oakland A 2002 when they found themselves in the difficult position having to replace an A-list director involved in the project.
Initially designed by award-winning screenwriter Steve Zaillian Academy producer ("Schindler's List") to adapt the book into a screenplay by Lewis and David Frankel ("The Devil Wears Prada") to direct the film. Brad Pitt was chosen as Billy Beane and then as a producer. However, several months after his script became Zaillian, Sony Pictures has decided to change course and seek a new version to be written and directed by Steven Soderbergh ("Traffic").
Obsessed with authenticity and realism, Soderbergh has chosen a documentary style of "Moneyball." Their fidelity to the reality of history led him to remove all items that do not happen in real life. This consisted of little character moments and dialogue with all who had seen as a complete creation of a writer. His vision involved the use of interviews with real people involved in the facts to tell the story, but this difference was a revised version of the large initial cut. In closing, with an investment of about $ 47 million, Sony wanted a bright Soderbergh film, not a cinematic masterpiece.
Anse Soderbergh script that too much of a departure from what they had signed, Sony canceled the project just five days before principle photography was to begin. Soderbergh has been authorized to give his version of the film to other studios, but left the project after no takers were found. Despite an intense loyalty to Soderbergh, Brad Pitt stayed on board.
The move to "save" the film, Sony hired veteran screenwriter Aaron Sorkin to rewrite the original script Zaillian. Sorkin, perhaps best known as a writer / producer of "The West Wing," was working, "Money Ball" producer Michael De Luca, Scott Rudin and the second film based on a successful book, "social networks" (which will earn an Oscar for Best Screenplay). In addition, Bennett Miller ("Capote") have been taken directly from the film stopped.
The resulting changes worked particularly well when the script is filled with rich dialogue, strong characters and genuine moments of comedy. Bean life as a divorced father of a loving daughter in the film is developed and provides some really touching moments. The total adjustment is a real achievement and a tribute to the talented writers involved. Michael Lewis's book is filled with numbers and statistics without a proper narrative structure or manifest dramatic arcs. A film version of the book should not work, but still.
"Money Ball" is a study of characters in it, and director Bennett Miller, is the ability to investigate human nature. The film is full of small moments of character driven than dwelling on the screen long enough to allow the public to perceive what the character is thinking, although the lack of dialogue. Miller is an instructor who takes time to give patients the scenes important to play out and not be afraid to stay longer in the body of the other leaders should be generally comfortable.
What makes "money ball" so compelling is also what often makes the game of baseball itself, convincing, and there are often several levels of drama going on at once. The drama feels real because it is the events depicted actually took place. Surprisingly, some of the most improbable events that occur in the film (which could lead to suspect a certain artistic license) is actually true.
"Moneyball" is not so much about the game of baseball, because it is a second chance. Second Chance is shared by the film's protagonist, Billy Beane, and enlists in his services. This movie is about bucking the system and defy the prejudices and conventions established to give homeless people the opportunity to succeed. The film challenges the audience to not get caught up in the story of Billy Beane, a man whose life was shattered by the game of baseball. "Moneyball" brilliantly captures how the game of baseball was defeated by Billy Beane.