Fever Pitch

Nick Hornby's acclaimed memoir about one man's struggle to balance his love of a woman and his love for soccer was the basis of a well-reviewed British film in 1997, and now gets a Americanized rewrite with this picture, in which the game is changed from soccer to baseball. Ben (Jimmy Fallon) is a ...more

The American version of Fever Pitch does a fine job of changing little aspects of the lead character in order to make him both more American and more palatable to American audiences. The original British character, obsessed with the football club Arsenal, was prickly even aside from his obsession. The obsession seemed a natural part of his less-than-pleasant psychological makeup. Jimmy Fallon's Red Sox-loving Ben has had his rough edges sanded down. His character lacks the full-blown misanthropy ...more