Rating: 
Summary: Mr. Jones Takes Command
Review: "Cobb" is a tragic and humorous account of the tumultuous life of the baseball legend. Tommy Lee Jones delivers an intense, gripping portrayal of the aging, diseased, foul-mouthed, volatile old man known as Cobb, yet still manages to draw sympathy and intrigue from viewers. Jones' mastery of this character is evident as a mere glance or gesture from Cobb can evoke dramatic tension, anger, and humor from anyone unfortunate enough to be near him. I couldn't take my eyes away from Tommy Lee Jones. This film is incredible!!
Rating:
Summary: Cobb: A man with demons that made him a legend
Review: A must have entertaining DVD. The dark side of Cobb, with a touch of humor. Includes TWO commentary tracks (Director, and Jones and Wuhl), a few deleted scenes, the real Al Stump, and on the field with Roger Clemons You will not be disappointed..
Rating: 
Summary: Not what I expected
Review: Based on the autobiography by Al Stump, this movie is not what I expected. Up front, I think Ty Cobb is the greatest ballplayer who ever lived. This movie did not do justice to his playing days. Most of the movie focused on his later life, and more so on his interaction with Al Stump. Very little was shown specifically related to his younger days or playing ball. If you want to know about the player read the book, because the movie is not the way to go.
Rating: 
Summary: An El Crapola baseball movie
Review: Basically a hatchet job on Cobb; this movie focuses on
a few episodes from the year Cobb spent with writer
Stump composing his autobiography. It is very disturbing,
dark, and does not bring the classic game of the early
century to life, just the latter-day mean-spirited aspect
of Cobb. You would be far better off reading Stump's bio,
"Cobb",or Charles Alexander's Cobb bio. The acting is ok;
it's hard to argue with the casting of Wuhl and Jones, but ...This movie left me feeling queasy and in an angry mood.
There is so much more to Cobb than portrayed here. Sorry
this isn't the typical Amazon gushing 4-star review, but
this trashy film does nothing for baseball fans.
Rating:
Summary: "The Tiger Wore Spikes!"
Review: C is for Cobb,
Who grew spikes and not corn,
And made all the basemen,
Wish they weren't born.
Tyrus Raymond Cobb the greatest ball player in history! "I will take that to my grave!" The most feared player in history! Sending 13+ ball players to the hospital in one season alone, including spiking and beating an armless heckler! Even murder! The most hated man in baseball! Fans and players disliked him, hell everybody, even his own team mates hated him! This is without a doubt one of my favorite pictures of all time! I would like to see another picture made on Cobb just him playing ball in the 1905-1928 circa! The last sceen in B/W shows us the meanest man ever to step onto a field! God bless you Ty, my idol! ".367 Career BA, top that?" Please put "Shoeless" Joseph Jefferson Jackson in the Hall of Fame!
The years go on, the years slip by,
The heroes rise, the heroes die,
There'll come a day, not far away,
A day of fans that knew not Ty.
Rating:
Summary: Not a well know movie, but worth viewing!
Review: First off I want to say that although this movie revolves around Ty Cobb, it is not only about baseball. This movie probes deep into a very driven and disturbed ballplayer and husband. While watching the movie you go through what the director is hoping to convey to the viewer...first you hate Cobb, then you start to think that he may not be the monster he has been made out to be. The acting of Tommy Lee Jones is stellar! One of his finest performances of his well established career. This movie is hard to find on store shelves due to it was not very popular and still isnt, however that should not impeed you from seeing this 5-star film. There are many lines that are quotable for the rest of your life in this film. Cobb's view on the world in general is very entertaining. I laughed out loud many times during his frequent outbursts. My wife, who doesnt like baseball all that well, recommended this film to her grandparents, and they loved it.
So in closing, take two and a half hours and watch a film that will become a sought after movie for your own personal collection!
Rating:
Summary: How about a movie called...
Review: How about a movie called 'The Hammer'? Gee, they made 'Cobb, 'The Babe', 'Eight Men Out', 'Field of Dreams', 'The Pride of the Yankees', 'The Natural', and '61*'. How about a movie about Henry Aaron, Josh Gibson, Roberto Clemente, Willie Mays, or even Jackie Robinson? Oh, I forgot, baseball will never allow it...
Rating:
Summary: How about a movie called...
Review: How about if the film industry makes a movie called 'The Hammer'? Gee, they made 'Cobb, 'The Babe', 'Eight Men Out', 'Field of Dreams', 'The Pride of the Yankees', 'The Natural', and '61*'. Well, how about making a movie about Henry Aaron, Josh Gibson, Roberto Clemente, Willie Mays, or even Jackie Robinson? Oh, I forgot, baseball will never allow it...
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Review: I don't know why, but I usually love watching films about sports. Give me "Rudy," "The Natural," "Major League," "The Longest Yard," or a host of other similarly themed movies any day. Oh, there are a few exceptions, such as John Goodman's pathetic "The Babe," but I even like Penny Marshall's femfest "A League of Their Own." It's surprising that I enjoy watching these sorts of films; I don't play sports and, with the exception of seeing Nebraska's college football team routinely trounce all opponents (Yeah, it's been a tough few years, but we got rid of Frank Solich so watch out for the Huskers in the future), I never go to games or watch them on television. Perhaps I like films dealing with this topic because the pictures use sports as a metaphor for more important themes in life. "Rudy," for example, served as an excellent lesson on the value of perseverance and hard work. This 1994 film, the wonderfully bombastic "Cobb," gives us a different sort of message. The movie spends a lot of time showing that talent and character are often mutually exclusive terms. Should we idealize a man as unpleasant as Ty Cobb simply because he could hit a ball with a bat better than nearly everyone else? And since we often do turn monsters into icons, what does that tell us about our society and ourselves?
"Cobb" is a film version of a book written about the legendary ballplayer by a sportswriter named Al Stump. In the movie, Stump (Robert Wuhl) thinks he's on easy street when he learns that Ty Cobb (Tommy Lee Jones) has chosen him to pen his biography. Think about it! You're a sportswriter and the greatest athlete in the history of the game decides he wants you to stay with him for a period of several months so you can write his story. Think of all the secrets you'll learn, the great anecdotes about some of the legends of baseball, the intricacies of the game and how the greats played it. Unfortunately, Stump meets Cobb when the former player is an alcoholic, pill popping old crank nearing the end of his days. Al learns the hard way that working closely with Ty Cobb means routinely putting your life on the line. The sports legend likes to randomly fire his gun inside his house, and his driving skills leave a lot to be desired (especially on ice packed mountain roads). Stump quickly tires of Cobb's reckless disregard for life, the endless streams of profanity, the racism against blacks and other minorities, and the insults. The two men spend more time sparring with each other than working on the book, but when they do get around to writing there's a problem. Cobb wants the book to focus on his exploits as an athlete, and Stump wants to write about the man's personal life.
Stump decides to write two books, the one Cobb wants and the one he wants. But finishing the books takes great persistence. The sportswriter soon becomes more of a confidante and health care worker to the aging legend than his biographer. Cobb's diabetes requires daily injections of insulin, which Stump soon administers. When the Baseball Hall of Fame plans to induct Cobb, the two must go through a whole series of tiresome preparations. And then there's the endless recollections of the player's early life, a life full of heartache and triumph that Stump desperately wants to put in the book but which Cobb rejects for fear of looking bad. To muddy the waters, Ty lies about his private life by changing stories on a routine basis so Stump never knows what is real and what is fantasy. For example, there's the mystery surrounding the ballplayer's parents. The former athlete tells the writer that his father died violently, but continually changes the specifics of the story. First, his father perished accidentally. Then we learn that he died as the result of finding his mother cheating with another man. Then there's a final story twist. What really happened and how did it affect Ty Cobb's early years? Stump must sift through what he learns to reach an approximation of the truth.
"Cobb" is a great movie filled with convincing performances, unpleasant situations, and even humor. A diehard sports fanatic might not like the picture since it focuses more on personality and not the game itself. We do see flashbacks to Ty Cobb bullying his way through a few games, but the movie uses these scenes as elaboration on the man's character and not as a way to show his talent. According to the film, this guy beat a crippled fan, assaulted his wife, bet on games, and possibly murdered a man in a back alley. Nice chap, huh? At the same time, the movie tries to show that even the worst characters possess endearing traits. For instance, we learn that Cobb financially supported at least one of his former teammates. Which one of these men is the real Ty Cobb? Both of them. Jones plays the character with a gusto that leaps off the screen, easily overshadowing Robert Wuhl's restrained portrayal of Al Stump. The sultry Lolita Davidovich shows up as a woman who falls into the wily clutches of an elderly Ty Cobb and thus exposes another facet of the man's complex personality.
The DVD edition contains two commentary tracks, a trailer, a look at the real Al Stump, a few additional scenes, and a short bit with Roger Clemens. I must have seen "Cobb" a dozen times back in the mid 1990s when pay television aired the film around the clock. My recent viewing of the movie only served as a reminder of the film's greatness. Clocking in at over two hours, "Cobb" is wonderful cinematic exploration that asks several penetrating questions about the men who play professional sports and the society that idolizes them.
Rating:
Summary: Probably the best baseball movie ever
Review: I saw this film on swedish T.V. but anyway, I've expectedbaseball from the first minute, to the last. I do not got that. I'vegot a great movie featuring the Georgia Peach, the greatest asshole that ever lived on the earth. Lee Jones plays this role in a very good way. During the movie (Which surrondings is ca. 1960) We met Cobb as an alcoholican and as a racist from The Old South. Cobb makes brawl, and the baseball sequences (which is around 3 minutes of the movie) shows us his spikes, and his exellent hitting and basestealing. We meet also old stars like Sammy Crawford, Rogers Hornsby and Paul Warner (in other caracters of course) . . . Robert Wuhl (my favourite actor) is perfect as Al Stump, the poor baseball writer Rent or Buy this!
|
