Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #56981 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-07-04
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Dubbed, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Arabic, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish
• Dubbed in: French, German, Italian, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 123 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Penny Marshall's popular 1992 comedy sheds light on a little-known chapter of American sports history with its story of a struggling team in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. The league was formed when the recruiting of soldiers during World War II resulted in a shortage of men's baseball teams. The AAGPBL continued after the war (until 1954), and Marshall's movie depicts the league in full swing, beginning when a savvy baseball scout (Jon Lovitz) finds a pair of promising new players in small-town Oregon sisters (Geena Davis, Lori Petty). The sisters are signed to play for the Rockford Peaches near Chicago, whose new manager (Tom Hanks) is a former home-run king who wrecked his career with alcoholism. They're all a bunch of underdogs, and Marshall (with a witty script by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel) does a fine job of establishing a colorful team of supporting players including Madonna and (in her movie debut) Rosie O'Donnell. It's a conventional Hollywood sports story (Marshall's never been one to take dramatic risks) but the stellar cast is delightful and the movie's filled with memorable moments, witty dialogue and agreeable sentiment. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

Special Features
2.35 Wide Screen
16:9 Wide Screen
DVD 9
French\German\Italian\Spanish
English
Region 2
Dolby Quad Surround Englsih
Surround French German Italian Spanish
Dolby Quad Surround
Surround
Interactive Menus
Documentary
Filmographies
Madonna Music Video
Trailers
Behind The Scenes Featurette
Scene Selections
Arabic\Czech\Danish\Dutch\Finnish\French\German\Greek\Hebrew\Hindi\Hungarian\Icelandic\Italian\Norwegian\Polish\Portuguese\Spanish\Swedish\Turkish

Synopsis
In 1943 when the ranks of professional male baseball players were leaving for the war, a group of ladies left their homes to become part of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League and kept baseball alive for a grateful nation. This is their story. Dottie Hinson (Geena Davis) is the team's most gifted player,and the camaraderie and jealousy with her sister (Lori Petty) is part of this film's charm and complexity. Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks) is the drunken ex-player and slob manager who eventually brings the team to success. Directed by Penny Marshall (BIG, AWAKENINGS) and also starring Madonna, Jon Lovitz and Bill Pullman.

Customer Reviews

An amazing film, has you hooked all the way through......
Easily my favourite film of all time, something that everyone can enjoy, if not for the film itself, the sport, the genre, there's something for anyone! With a cast of acclaimed actors and actresses, it offers more than the average film and induces you into its tale of happiness, losses and fortune.

A Great Movie
Since its release I have watched this film many times - at the cinema, on video, on TV and now on DVD - and every time it makes me tense and excited during the baseball games and tearful during the emotional parts. Geena, Tom, Rosie and Lori are great but for me it's Madonna's amazing performance in the dug out when she's told the league may close and she'll have to return to her poor, disadvantaged roots that steals the show! I always have to dry my eyes at that part! I could not recommend this movie enough!

League of Their Own
Like so many films that have a sporting theme, "A League of their own" does follow a fairly predictable storyline. It has all the elements we've seen in so many films that have both gone before it and come after it; a team of nobodies, a rare old mixture of misfits and different personality types. There's the brass loud mouth, the sexy tart (with a heart of course), the plain shy one and so on and so on. The composition of the film is also pretty unsurprising with long montages of thrilling sports snippets and buddy-buddy hug scenes in the dressing room. Obviously the main difference this time is that the team involved is a female baseball team.

It's the Second World War and in fear that the draft of star Major League Baseball players into the armed forces will cause the league to be closed down, the main team owners decide to create an all female league to keep things going whilst the men are away. Scouts are sent around the country and one comes to a little farming community where he meets and signs up catcher Dottie Hinson (Geena Davis) and her kid sister Kit Keller. The girls are formed into the Rockford Peaches and the soon start making the headlines, not only for their sporting prowess.

To only consider the film on its sporting merits though is to really miss the point. What it does throw up is an extremely important period for women when for basically the first time every the "fairer sex" was called up to serve their countries. Women poured into the factories and the workplace to keep the war machine rolling on and I think that the ladies realised what life and opportunities were now open to them. Was it any surprise that when the men came marching home the ladies resisted being packed away back into the kitchen.

The performances are great, Geena Davis is lovely as the "league's best player" and I'd never really realised what a beauty she is. Tom Hanks as the team's alcoholic coach is a bit of a change from his normal good guy he plays, here he's tobacco spitting and generally mean to his girls. There is some good atmosphere generated between Davis and Hanks and you are left to wonder "what if" it was Dottie's husband who didn't come back from the war. Lori Petty as Dottie's sister also puts in a fine performance and although he character is jealous and unfair you never loose sympathy with her and you do enjoy her final victory at the end. Madonna and Rosie O'Donnell as other team-mates put in great entertaining parts and also mention for Jon Lovitz as the talent scout who does a perfect line in sharp one-liners.

The ending is cloyingly sentimental and rather over the top, but it does work. My wife was in floods and something seemed to have got in my eye also as it was watering rather badly.

Great fun film and also very suitable for family viewing.