Product Description

From the director of The Sandlot comes the true story of an underdog coach and the team that must defend their legacy against insurmountable odds. In the small town of Norway, Iowa, the high school baseball team, led by legendary Coach Jim Van Scoyoc (Powers Boothe, TV's Deadwood), has won 19 State Championships. But the small town heroes are dealt a series of unexpected blows that threaten to rob them of their 20th championship win. When talk of a school merger gets serious and Coach Scoyoc is fired, then replaced by his 24-year-old assistant, Kent Stock (Sean Astin, Rudy and The Lord of the Rings trilogy), failure seems inevitable. Tom Arnold, Rachael Leigh Cook and Michael Angarano join an excellent ensemble cast in this inspirational family gem.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5545 in DVD
• Brand: Unknown
• Released on: 2008-04-15
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
• Formats: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .25 pounds
• Running time: 119 minutes

Amazon.com
Touching and inspirational, The Final Season, based on a true story, is one of those baseball movies in which the game is synonymous with life itself—if not actually bigger than life itself. Sean Astin (star of one of the most beloved sports films, Rudy) is solid and likeable as Kent Stock, an assistant baseball coach at Norway High School in an Iowa farming community. Working under local legend Jim Van Scoyoc (Powers Boothe in a particularly golden performance), who led Norway to 19 straight state championships, Stock is happy to lend a temporary hand. But he finds his destiny altered when Van Scoyoc is pushed aside by a school board determined to close Norway High and stifle dissent by undercutting the team’s chances of a 20th victory. On the wrongheaded assumption that Stock can’t motivate kids, the coaching job is offered to him, and he takes to it immediately in his low-key way. Despite early struggles, Stock inspires his players to think about what’s important in Norway’s last shot at greatness: How do they want to be remembered?

Directed by David Mickey Evans (The Sandlot), The Final Season is thick with love for baseball, from extensive scenes of practice sessions to lyrical patches of dialogue about the way the characters of men are reflected in how they perform on the field. A Copland-esque music score reminds one that The Final Season is a piece of American folklore, and a strong support cast including Tom Arnold as one of Van Scoyoc’s former players, Michael Angarano as a troubled rebel, and Rachel Leigh Cook as Stock’s love interest make this film a pleasure even for non-sports-loving fans. --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

an entertaining movie
After seeing an interview with Sean Astin, (who plays the lead role in the film "The final season"), I decided to take my 10 & 13 year old children to see his new movie. Due to it's limited release, we had to drive 90 minutes to the next city to see it, but it was well worth the drive and the price of tickets. This is an enjoyable film! This is a good stoy! (and I don't even like baseball!) In a nutshell: big-town, messed-up kid arrives in small town w/ strong family values, and messed-up kid (and his prodigal dad) find the real value in family and community. All this set against a memorable backdrop of the Midwest, and a love of baseball. My favorite scene: shows the team warming up to the tune of an orchestra, plays each member of the team as a dancer in an intricate ballet, and the 'snap' of the ball into the player's mitt as part of the percussive instruments in the orchestra: Bravo!

Extra innings
The Final Season is definitely worth your time. This true story plays out in America's heartland and represents a huge cross section of rural America.

The Final Season reveals a truth not everyone seems to understand: its not all in the winning its how you play the game. Character, achievement and honest completion actually carry greater value than putting together a winning record.

The Norway baseball team may meet their collective demise but they prove sportsmanship and team achievement ensure their place in history. Join the team and catch the inspiration to play with all you've got!

The Final Season, inspirational baseball
Although I live near Washington D.C. now, I was raised in the Midwest and went to a rural farm community high school in Piasa, Illinois. Perhaps that helped me identify with this movie about Norway, Iowa, but if anyone can't identify with it on some level then they are missing something. I was lucky enough to play on a football team that won three championships. Considering we didn't have half the students of most the schools we played I know only to well the lesson "The Final Season" teaches about sports. If we didn't have students bused in from three small towns and we weren't so far from the large schools we probably would have been absorbed as well. Along with it's valuable lesson about what baseball means to these small towns, it teaches about how crowding students into larger schools doesn't make them smarter or better adjusted students, quite the contrary, and the sooner the public education system learns that the better. This movie has a great story, wonderful cast, and exceptional camera work. I highly recommend it. I haven't seen a sports movie inspire me this much since "Hoosiers". Excellent DVD quality with great replayability.