When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

An aimless young man (Keanu Reeves) who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.Keanu Reeves's performance in "Hardball" earned him a Razzie Award nomination for Worst Actor (also for "Sweet November"), but he lost the award to Tom Green for "Freddy Got Fingered". Interestingly, I see "Freddy" as a misunderstood masterpiece... and hardly think Reeves is bad in "Hardball" (whereas "Sweet November" is just a bad movie).One could complain that this film has the "white savior" problem, with a white man saving the lives (figuratively) of an all-black team. I did not have that issue. There are some familiar plot devices, but all in all it is an enjoyable movie... one that maybe should be re-examined.

Hardball (2001): Dir: Brian Robbins / Cast: Keanu Reeves, Diane Lane, D.B. Sweeney, John Hawkes, Michael B. Jordan: 80, 000, 000th sports baseball movie about the hardened lives kids endure. It stars Keanu Reeves as a drunken gambler thrust into coaching an urban kids baseball team by a friend who will pay him $500 a week to do so. He figures that the money will pay off debts but he never factored in the behavior. This all leads to a happy ending for all save for the audience. Director Brian Robbins is responsible for Varsity Blues, as well as such crap as Good Burger and Ready to Rumble. He lets the material get away on him like a bunch of kids at an amusement park. It has no originality and characters say lines like, "I'm blown away by your ability to show up." I am blown away by his ability to say that with a straight face. Reeves makes little impression playing a role that has been done fifty times over. Diane Lane is basically a romantic prop for when Reeves has a free moment. Are we to be surprised when these two hook up? D.B. Sweeney plays Reeves's crime pal, although being in this film is perhaps his biggest crime. This is the kind of film that you line up and bat baseballs at just to see if one can smash a dent in it. It is one of the worst sports films ever made. Arguably about inner city kids seeking opportunity but the formula has been done so many times that it hits too many foul balls. Score: 1 / 10

A fairly good ball movie, Brian Robbins' "Hardball" stars Keanu Reeves as a chronic gambler who agrees to coach a children's baseball team in the hopes of paying off outstanding debts. Along the way, kids and adults grow, change and learn valuable life lessons.Formulaic? Yes, but "Hardball" does some interesting things. Like "Bad News Bears" it mixes sentimentality with grit, and elsewhere paints a depressing portrait of urban life, specifically the hardships faced by those growing up in Chicago's ABLA housing projects. The film's cinematography is at times novel – lots of redbrick tower blocks, sunbaked pitches and dank bars – and the always ethereal Diane Lane melts the eyes. Based loosely on a true story.7.9/10 – See "Bull Durham" and "Up For Grabs".

Imagine what Hollywood would make if it combined "The Bad News Bears" with "Boyz N the Hood?" Or "The Mighty Ducks" got tight with "Dangerous Minds?" "Varsity Blues" director Brian Robbins and "Summer Catch" scenarist John Gatins cover "Hardball" with so much sap they should have called it "Spitball." This hopelessly derivative and shamelessly schmaltzy sporting fable offers little that hasn't been done better before, aside from its star appearing in such a movie. Hollywood spouts ideological gobbledygook through both dialogue and actions. "Hardball" rolls back time to the 'white man's burden' problem dramas. I haven't seen anything in the press about Spike Lee's reaction to "Hardball," but I'm dying to know about his complaints. "Hardball" dodges the question why whites are coaching blacks in modern-day American team sports. Is this commentary about the paucity of black role models in contemporary America? "Hardball" mirrors the 1965 Moynihan report. Assistant Secretary of Labor Daniel Patrick Moynihan argued racism prevented African-American men in the ghettos from obtaining good paying jobs. Humiliated because they could not support their families, these men without self-esteem abandoned their role as husbands and/or fathers and fled, leaving their wives an awful burden. "Hardball" projects this image of African-Americans in Chicago's real-life Cabrini Green, more of a war-zone itself than a housing project. Lacking black father role-models for themselves, a team of foul-mouthed fifth graders bond with an amoral, compulsive gambler who smokes like a chimney, guzzles like a fish, and frequents sports bars. Baseball redeems oddballs in this bummer of a hardboiled sandlot saga. Reportedly, Paramount Pictures slashed the controversial R-rated version of this rough-hewn opus and wound up with a strongly-worded PG-13 rating. Nevertheless, Gatins' heavy-handed, tear jerking morality tale still comes out swinging.Prepare yourself for the worst if you waltz into "Hardball" hoping for a "Cosby" sitcom. This cynical, no-holds-barred, saga about social conscientiousness reforms the unsavory Conor O'Neill (Keanu Reeves of "The Matrix") after he agrees to coach the KeKambas, an impoverished Chicago Housing Authority Little League baseball club. Conor owes several grand to several bone-crushing thugs when he asks his arrogant stockbroker chum, Jimmy (Mike McGlone of "The Brothers McMullen"), for a loan. Instead, Jimmy pays Conor $500-a-week to supervise a team of African-American misfits. Conor tutors two of them before their tough-minded Catholic school English teacher Elizabeth Wilkes (Diane Lane of "The Perfect Storm") lets them suit up. Of course, each character boasts some trait or affliction that sets him aside from the others. A chubby athlete struggles with asthma; one wears glasses; another isn't old enough; and two brawl like bobcats. When Conor stages batting practice, these fifth graders watch the balls either bounce off them or fly past them. They ridicule each other without mercy. Conor cuts out the name calling, and the boys get down to business. Incredibly, KeKambas' pitcher Miles Pennfield II (Alan Ellis, Jr.) emerges as a strike-out ace. The secret of Miles' success is his Walkman and the Notorious B.I.G. tune "Big Poppa" that he listens to repeatedly and relies on for a sense of rhythm. Eventually, villainous opposing team coach Matt Hyland (D.B. Sweeney of "The Cutting Edge") forces Miles to remove them, and our hero suffers like Samson with shorn hair. The best example of Hyland's villainy occurs when G-Baby (DeWayne Warren), clearly under age, steps up to the plate for his first time at a crucial point in a game. Sadly, neither Robbins nor Gatins tap Sweeney's obnoxious coach for a greater source of drama. John Gatins' convoluted screenplay consists of two interwoven stories: the plight of the KeKambas and O'Neill's gambling habit. The overnight transformation of the KeKambas when Conor takes them to a ball game is as far-fetched as they are goofy."Hardball" hurls Keanu Reeves his most unorthodox role. As Conor O'Neill, he incarnates the most credible but contemptible character in his career. "Hardball" pokes fun at its hero but commendably keeps our anti-hero in peril. Robbins doesn't depict Conor in a complimentary light, until our protagonist undergoes his Biblical Paul-on-the-road-to-Damascus conversion and shuns gambling. Conor's transition from sinner to saint is outlandishly melodramatic. Typically derided for giving wooden performances, Keanu Reeves burrows farther into this role than any other.Diane Lane does wonders with her one-dimensional role. Since the kids trust Conor, she warms up to the lout. Robbins, who helmed "Ready To Rumble," never lets the Lane & Reeves romance interfere with the action on the field. Their best scene together occurs at school when Conor accuses Elizabeth of liking him. This scene represents one of Keanu Reeves' closest scraps with acting. Pouring out personality, he indulges in elaborate gestures and facial expressions. Lane and he generate a modicum of chemistry, and they make a believable couple. The plot transition that brings them together is too good to be true, so you'll either applaud it or laugh yourself silly about it.Robbins misses more than he hits in "Hardball" as a director. He makes us aware of social consciousness issues, chiefly the precarious environment where the KeKambas live. Dope-pedaling, trigger-happy gangstas plague the housing project and prey on the kids. Residents huddle on the floor beneath window level for safety's sake. Nevertheless, he fares well with some scenes, especially when asthmatic Jefferson (Julian Griffith) tries to get home after dark and gangstas attack him. This is a pretty chilling scene. Meanwhile, just when Conor believes he is washed up, his luck abruptly changes for the better. Predictably, the KeKambas win the pennant, but not before sudden tragedy of the "Pay It Forward" variety exerts a terrible toll on them. This is the lowest and wildest pitch Robbins makes in an effort to win us over to this maudlin melodrama. Even if you hate "Hardball," as I did, you'll find it difficult to exit with a dry eye.