Customer Reviews

A League of Their Own

5 star:		(82)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one of my favourite films, it made me want to watch it again and again. With an all star cast including Geena Davis, Lotti perri and Tom Hanks, who give brilliant and funny performances. This film is funny,tear jerking and an all round good film. The storyline is brilliant and what more can i say....its definately worth buying!

The 2-Disc DVD Special Edition of 1992's "A League Of Their Own" (released on April 20, 2004) scores a grand-slam on my DVD Scorecard. Sporting a fun array of bonus features, a beautiful anamorphically-enhanced widescreen picture, and very clever menu screens, this DVD version of this timeless motion picture is a winner all the way around.

Although the film has a relatively-lengthy run time of 2 hours & 8 minutes, it never wears out its welcome or gets tiresome. The first-rate cast sees to that -- a cast that features the likes of Tom Hanks, Geena Davis, Madonna, Rosie O'Donnell, Lori Petty, and Jon Lovitz.

Lovitz is fall-down hilarious as the scout who plucks Geena and Lori off of their Oregon farm to join the first professional girls' baseball league. He offers up one zinger after another during his short stint in this movie, such as his explanation to the other girls as to why he can't sign up second baseman Marla Hooch (who isn't likely to win the Miss America Pageant anytime soon) -- "You know General Omar Bradley? Well, there's too strong a resemblance."

DVD Special Features for the 2-Disc "Special Edition" ..............

>> A very nice 52-minute documentary on the making of the film, "Nine Memorable Innings", featuring new interviews with the cast and crew, and some behind-the-scenes footage.

>> 15 Deleted Scenes. Many of these cut scenes flesh out some of the movie's shorter scenes. Some very interesting stuff here too. You can play each of these scenes separately, or via a "Play All" option. And these can be played with or without a "Director's Introduction" preceding each clip from Penny Marshall. Total run time: 36:02 with intros, or 32:39 without them.

>> Commentary Track, with Director Penny Marshall and some of the cast members.

>> 3 Trailers -- Including the excellent and funny trailer for this movie, plus bonus trailers for two other sports films ("Brian's Song" and "The Natural").

>> Madonna Music Video -- "This Used To Be My Playground" (run time: 5:02).

>> Cast & Crew Filmographies (text only).

>> A French Language Track (in 2.0 Dolby Surround).

>> English Subtitles.

VIDEO -- The movie is presented on Disc #1 (which is dual-sided with no disc art), with Side A being the Widescreen (2.35:1 aspect ratio) version and Side B being a Full-Screen (1.33:1) Pan-and-Scan version. Now why anybody on the planet would prefer the Full-Screen (aka: "butchered all to hell") variant is beyond my comprehension. (Especially a super-wide 2.35:1 ratio film like this one, where, in the 1.33:1 version you're missing about 45% of the screen image at all times.) But, to each his own. IMO, however, the Widescreen is the ONLY way to go here (or with any other movie, for that matter).

The Widescreen transfer here looks A-1. Very clear, no "jaggies" in the background that I could see, with great color.

AUDIO -- The box shows a "4.0 Surround" English audio track. But my Player reads the sound as "3.1 Dolby Digital". Kind of strange, I thought. But, regardless of the individual number of discrete channels here, it sounds great. The previous DVD version of this movie was done in 2.0 Dolby Surround; and this SE is at least up to par with that older disc, IMO.

MENUS -- A really well-done "baseball-themed" Menu design here. The "Scene Selection" screens are designed so that each scene choice looks like a baseball card, complete with an "AAGPBL" ("All-American Girls Professional Baseball League") logo in the corner. Also shown on each of the Chapter screens is a simulated "baseball card" featuring one of the "players" (or manager) that appears in the movie.

The Main Menu for disc #2, which holds all the bonus material, is cleverly laid out to represent a page of a newspaper, with the menu choices integrated into the "headlines" of the paper. Very cool. As is the disc art for the second disc, which is made up to look like a baseball.

This flick beckons to be viewed a minimum of once per year. And perhaps even more frequently thanks to this fine two-disc SE that is now available. It's a movie that is just plain fun to sit through. And that's not likely to change, even many years down the road.

"A League Of Their Own" will remain in a class all its own for a long, long time to come.

I absolutely love this movie. I watched it at least 25 times & still enjoy it every time! Madonna & Rosie are fabulous in their roles...

Well I'm biased because my cusin is in this movie. He dances with madonna in the bar sceen.. But I still think that it's a good movie.

A League of their own is a terrific film. With plenty of laughs, and heart. It is a tale about two sisters who get to play in the women 's baseball team during WW2.
Penny Marshall does a good job with the action scenes, and the overrall light tone of the film. The real triumph of the movie is the perfect casting
Geena Davis plays all star catcher Dottie Henssion to perfection. She's very enjoyable and her chemistry with Hanks is unbelieveble.
Next Tom Hanks plays washed up player turned coach Jimmy Dugan. He's funny, and delivers the most famous line " there's no crying in baseball" wonderfully. Rosie O'donell plays the funny, talented player Dorris who's best friend is the infamous Mae played by Madona who does a good job in her usual typcast part.
The standout { and suprise} of the cast is Lori Petty who plays the tough,and fiesty Kit Keller Dottie's younger sister. She's plays the part with sas and spunk and deserves more credit for the performance then she seemed to get. Also the two sisters chemisrty is also great, which is pivital to the running of the film.

Overall this is a great film for everybody. Plus the DVD is packed with plenty of features for extra enjoyment. Thisis a MUST have DVD

"A League of Their Own" (1992), directed by Penny Marshall, takes place during the World War II era. Since a lot of male baseball players were being drafted to the armed forces, an All American Girls Baseball League was formed to try to keep the prosperity of baseball alive in America. The two main characters Dottie Hinson (Geena Davis) and Kit Keller (Lori Petty) join up with a whole turnout of women including the flirtatious Mae Mordabito (Madonna) and the strong, bold Doris Murphy (Rosie O'Donnell), and experience life as a female athlete during the 1940's. Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks) is one of the male coaches hired to coach one of the all woman teams, and is one of the many that show transformation throughout the season.
This movie is full of stereotypical ideas of what a female should be, but that is not to say that the movie promotes these ideas. Some examples could be shown through the uniforms that the women are forced to wear, which consists of a skirt! As stated in the movie, the women are to act "ladylike" and are sent to a beauty school, where they are taught "ladylike" manners and are given makeovers. We see in Dottie Hinson, whose husband Bob Hinson (Bill Pullman) is away at war, the outlook of women back then as she almost quits the league by the final game because Bob returns from the war and Dottie's aspirations are to start a family and be a housewife. Even in Jimmy Dugan, the coach barely cares at first about the team and states "girls can't play baseball", and how he doesn't have a team of ballplayers, but a "team of girls". We see a transformation however in him that shows his true love of the game, looking past what gender roles were considered back then. Although there are many more, one last example discussed here is Marla (Megan Cavanagh), who is a better hitter than most men, yet is almost not allowed in the league because she is considered "ugly".
This movie was excellent. It shows how hard it was for women to be taken seriously outside of "housewife" labels that were bestowed upon them, yet it adds great humor throughout to make it a very entertaining, yet educational film!

OK, this is my favorite movie ever, i know like all the lines. Ive played softball for 10 years and its my life, and whenever i watch this movie i feel so proud, haha. People have an idea that softball players are like men and its not true, and this movie shows that. You have manly girls in every sport you know. I feel so proud, it sounds lame but oh well. It makes me cry, haha.

A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN is spectaculary beautiful and very funny. Of all the team players, Davis is the stand out, giving a touchingly modest performance that shows her range and diversity when it comes to choosing parts in cinema. Her split scene is still my favorite scene in a film ever. And I mean ever.

I'm buying this movie now so that my daughters can watch it when they are old enough to understand it. Great examples of strong women and building team camaraderie. Besides this, it is a well-acted, well-directed movie. Everytime it comes on cable, my husband and I stop to watch it. I still cry at the same parts of the movie too even though I've seen it at least 10 times.

This film drew attention to a largely forgotten footnote in the history of American baseball, the All American Girls Professional Baseball League, a league of female players who began when the major league men went off to fight WWII and who managed to endure until 1954. That is perhaps its greatest achievement. As a film, it is a pretty formulaic story of reliable stock characters bonding and enduring adversity with a big showdown at the World Series at the end. Penny Marshall's direction is efficient, the cast is very good, and the script by Babaloo Mandel and Lowell Ganz provides some good laughs, resulting in an entertaining if conventional Hollywood film. I was touched more than I expected when the players reunite after many years at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown at the end. Rather than putting aging make-up on the actresses, the filmmakers found some remarkably similar doubles to portray the characters as older women.