Product Details

• Actors: Jon Gries, Sami Roe, Jeff Olson, Big Budah, Jeff Herr (III)
• Directors: Desmond Nakano
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: Unrated
• Studio: Warner Home Video
• DVD Release Date: May 22, 2007
• Run Time: 106 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000NTPG7A
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #24,024 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

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• For more information about "American Pastime" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

American Pastime views a dark slice of American history--the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II--affectingly through the prism of the all-American game of baseball. The film shines the light of hope through some of the bleakest moments in the lives of the relocated families, as baseball becomes a way to cope with the unmanageable. The stars, especially Masatoshi Nakamura, Judy Ongg, and Leonardo Nam, give hushed, affecting performances, allowing the story almost to unfold around them. Gary Cole (The West Wing) plays a minor-league player and guard at the internment camp Topaz, and pursues his own hopes of a major-league career against the near-nightmarish backdrop. Baseball has often been used as a metaphor in American film, but almost never as affectingly as in American Pastime. The DVD's making-of featurette, "Go for Broke: Behind American Pastime," is in some ways even more moving than the film, since it features interviews with real survivors of the internment camps, including Topaz and Manzanar. Also interviewed are several Japanese American soldiers from the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, who courageously fought for America in World War II even as their family members and friends were detained in the camps. Cole says in the featurette, "America really wanted to sweep [the internment camps] under the rug"--but thanks to the film and the documentary, the real history can be illuminated. --A.T. Hurley

Product Description

Powerful story about the dramatic impact WWII had in the home-front as Japanese American families were uprooted from their every day lives and placed into internment camps in Western US in the early 1940's. Faced with a country that now doubted their loyalty and struggling with their new situation, they turn to baseball as a way to handle their plight and find the strength to stand up for themselves becoming a true symbol of honor and pride.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A friendly little baseball game between Americans during World War II, October 13, 2007

By	Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

I wonder if the U.S. government would have interred Japanese-Americans during World War II if Pearl Harbor had not happened, or even if the original plan of the Japanese had succeeded and they had formally declared war right before the attack. If there had not been a sneak attack and therefore no "day that will live in infamy," would that have changed what happened? Or was paranoia a necessary ingredient for the government to enact such a racist policy? "American Pastime" engenders such questions because virtually all of the film takes place in one of these interment camps. The title comes from the fact that the climax of the film is a baseball game between a team of Japanese-Americans from the camp and the local semi-pro team.

Lyle Nomura (Aaron Yoo) is so American he plays jazz saxophone. He also loves baseball and was going to go to college on a baseball scholarship when Pearl Harbor ended that dream. The Nomura family ends up in the Topaz Relocation Center near Abraham, Utah, and like the rest of the prisoners (they are called that in the film and not detainees) they try to make a new life in the camp. His brother Lane (Leonardo Nam) gets out of the camp by joining the Army and going off to fight in Europe for the country that has put his family in a camp. Their father, Kaz (Masatoshi Nakamura), loves baseball as much as he loves America and he sets up a league in the camp.

Top billing in the film goes to Gary Cole as Billy Burrell, a guard at Topaz who is hard hitting catcher for the local semi-pro baseball team (I understand Cole is the "big name" in the cast, but he should have gone with an "and" credit at the end). Cole's character is not the ultimate villain in the story; that would be the town's barber, Ed Tully (Jon Gries), who is the unrelenting racist in the film. But Burrell is the pivotal character because he is the one on the fence about the Japanese-Americans, especially after his son is killed in combat in the South Pacific. However, that does not appear to weigh as much on his mind as the fact that he almost made it to the Major Leagues. If Tully is the little devil on Burrell's shoulder there is another guard at the camp who is the angelic counterpart because he is the one who notices that the Japanese-Americans serving in the Army in Europe (such as Lane) are making a name for themselves as soldiers.

There have been other films set in such camps, such as "Come See the Paradise" and "Snow Falling on Cedars," which have primarily been romances set against the war and life in the camps. "American Pastime" does have a pair of young lovers from opposite sides of the fence (literally), but the romance takes a melodramatic term since Lyle falls for Katie (Sarah Drew), Burrell's daughter. Their fathers go the Montague-Capulet route on the subject, to the displeasure of their offspring and spouses, but the romance becomes a secondary consideration big game (even thought the two families actually manage to run into each other off the field DURING the game). The game itself is okay; as soon as you see who gets to be home team for this friendly little encounter a baseball fan should be able to figure out how this is going to play out. However, the movie does manage to come up with a way of making the final play of the game resolve a lot of the film's major issues.

I watched this 2007 movie after catching Ken Burns' documentary on PBS about "The War," where the story of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team was a major thread, so it was interesting to know what the charcters are talking about in this movie regarding the high casualties the unit took effecting the rescue of the "Lost Battalion" in the Vosges Mountains of France in October 1944. But such things are just a reminder that there is a much larger story out there about what happened to Japanese-Americans during World War II than what this movie can show us. The term "concentration camp" dates back to camp used by the British in South Africa during the Second Boer War. My understanding is that during World War II the relocation centers where 100,000 American citizens of Japanese decent were sent during World War II were called concentration camps at the time. Of course, after the war the term became identified with the death camps run by the Nazis in Europe, but when I watch a movie like "American Pastime" that reminds us of what we did to our own citizens, I cannot help but think of places like Topaz as concentration camps on American soil.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful baseball film and history lesson, May 23, 2007

By	L. Staudimeir "Movie Fan" (Los Angeles, Ca) - See all my reviews

Great small budget movie. This movie proves that independent film making is an American Treasure. Accessible story for all ages. Great History lesson with Baseball, family values and a love story. What more could you ask for...do not miss this one!!!!!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Go for broke, December 28, 2007

By	Golden Lion "Reader" (North Ogden, Ut United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

I found the movie very inspiration and appeal to the highest ideals of Christ: forgiveness, love, communicate that bridged culture chasms, courage against injustice, and inspiration to act. The movie highlights the dreary and dusty conditions of topaz and the sense of betrayal by the law and the court system. Go for broke signals the unified voice of the Japanese community to be great and through this courage gain the respect. The movie is about a forbidden love; a son who wants to prove loyalty; a son who died because of spite towards his father; a father who must forgive himself; a time of economic stabily; a localized environment of rural America with is dreams and disappointments; a respect between two parents of different race; 2500 dollars in quarters for the right to receive a haircut; a struggle to patch walls from dust; a mail order catalogue that improve quality of life; a fight; a kiss; and game won by a sincere question; a fence that separated lovers; a saxaphone and piano combination; two scholarships for a brigher hope, one a baseball pitching scholarship and another a music scholarship. I liked the message of love, community unity, endurance through adversity, and forgiveness found in this film.