Dennis Quaid tosses a winner in `Rookie’
Once one of Hollywood’s MVPs, Dennis Quaid earns honors as comeback player of the year for the G-rated “The Rookie,” opening in theaters Friday. Quaid makes the most of a starting assignment as Jim Morris, a Texas high school teacher who abandoned dreams of being a big league ballplayer after an arm injury.
“The Rookie” covers all the bases, throwing an occasional curve in baseball movie convention. Most sports movies would have been content to chart how Morris inspires his lackluster team to fulfill its championship potential, but that’s only half the story. After Morris rediscovers his fastball, his students strike a deal that if they win their division, then he must try out for a professional team.
Based on a true story, “The Rookie” is the best baseball movie since “Field of Dreams.” If the father-son estrangement and reconciliation subplot doesn’t get you, then seeing Morris’ heroics through his idolizing young son’s eyes will.
`Hunchback II’ rings a family-friendly bell
Disney’s produced-for-video “The Hunchback of Notre Dame II,” now available on VHS ($25) and DVD ($30), is less grand in scope and scaled down in design (those epic crowds in the original film have thinned way out). But it may nonetheless ring the bell for kids whose hearts have gone out to the good-hearted “Quasi.” Parents especially will appreciate that part deux is more family-friendly than the way-intense first film with its tragic deaths and untoward desires.
Disney has the bucks to lure back the original A-list voice cast, which compensates for the more limited animation. Tom Hulce is again the voice of the lovelorn bellringer, who falls for sweet Madellaine (Jennifer Love Hewitt), a circus performer under the thumb of the evil magician Sarousche (Michael McKean).
Sarousche forces Madellaine to cuddle up to Quasi so he can steal the bejeweled bell, La Fidel.
Friday it’s time to see `Clockstoppers’
Also in theaters Friday is “Clockstoppers,” a PG-rated Nickelodeon production that gives new meaning to the term “hypertime.” Jesse Bradford stars as 17-year-old Zak Gibbs, who gets his hands on a watch that can stop time. The requisite evil corporate villain (Michael Biehn) wants it for his own nefarious purposes.