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Features: DVD, Widescreen, Aspect Ratio 2.35:1, Dolby Digital (5.1), Featurettes, Commentary, Deleted Scenes, Inside Look, Trailers, English, Spanish Subtitled
According to Red Sox super-fan Ben Wrightman (Jimmy Fallon), finding romance is about as likely as his beloved team winning the World Series. But when Ben scores a beautiful new girlfriend (Drew Barrymore), suddenly anything is possible. Now the two passions in his life have a chance to go all the way... if he doesn't strike out first.
"Baseball, Boston and Drew Barrymore. Certainly sounds like a winning combination. " Chris Kaltenbach, Baltimore Sun
"Drew Barrymore...as usual, is adorable and perfect." Jami Bernard, New York Daily News
"It's been a while since a movie made the game of love this winning. " Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly
"Effortlessly entertaining romantic comedy." Wesley Morris, Boston Globe
Editor's Note
The Farrelly Brothers (THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY, DUMB & DUMBER) take a slight departure from their signature breed of over-the-top, gross-out humor and opt instead for sensitive restraint with this genuinely sweet love story. Credit is due in part to the writing team of Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel (SPANGLISH) who adapt Nick Hornby's popular British novel, moving it to Boston and exchanging the protagonist's obsession with soccer for an all-consuming love of baseball. Ever since his first childhood visit to Fenway Park, easygoing schoolteacher Ben (Jimmy Fallon) has been in love with the Boston Red Sox. When he meets a successful workaholic named Lindsey Meeks (Drew Barrymore), he warns her that being such an avid fan has been a problem in his past relationships. On the brink of turning 30, Lindsey is eager to make what seems like an otherwise promising romance work, and she agrees to go with Ben to opening day (of the eventful 2004 season when the Red Sox won the World Series for the first time in 86 years).As baseball season proceeds, the truly obsessive nature of Ben's hobby is revealed, and a love triangle is set up in which baseball plays the role of the other woman. Lindsey's feelings for Ben are put to the test again and again as his love for the game threatens to outweigh his feelings for her. While the film's structure is pretty typical of a romantic comedy, FEVER PITCH offers quirky characters that ring true. Fallon and Barrymore display a genuine chemistry and Fallon proves (after leaving SNL) that he can pull off the romantic lead. With the exception of Yankee fans, FEVER PITCH should appeal to anyone who has ever really loved another person (or a pastime).
| Features | 13 Deleted Scenes | | Audio: English Dolby Surround 5.1, Spanish & French Dolby Surround | | Break The Curse Internet Featurette | | Fox Movie Channel Presents - Making A Scene Fever Pitch | | Inside Look: In Her Shoes | | Love Triangle Internet Featurette | | Widescreen Presentation | | Inside Look: In Her Shoes | | Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1, Spanish, French Dolby Digital Surround | | Subtitles: English, Spanish | | Break the Curse Internet Featurette | | Fox Movie Channel Presents - Making a Scene Fever Pitch | | Comedy Trailer | | Gag Reel | | Theatrical Trailer | | Love Triangle Internet Featurette | | Seamlessly branched extended Red Sox ending! | | Commentary by Peter and Bobby Farrelly | | Deleted Scenes with optional commentary by Peter and Bobby Farrelly |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: Foxvideo |
| Release Date: 2/7/2006 |
| Running Time: 103 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 2005 | | Catalog ID: 2230894 | | UPC: 00024543208945 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English, French Dubbed, Spanish Dubbed | | Available Subtitles: English, Spanish | | Video: Color |
| Cast & Crew
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| | Professional Reviews | Entertainment Weekly
"The two actors are wonderfully matched....It's been a while since a movie made the game of love this winning." 04/15/2005 p.56-57Los Angeles Times
"A sweet and often hilarious movie about modern romance and its fearsome adversary, modern life..." 04/08/2005 p.E1 New York Times
"[T]horoughly winning..." 04/08/2005 p.E1 Chicago Sun-Times
"Jimmy Fallon is perfectly cast in the role....He achieves a kind of perfection in his high spirits, his boyish enthusiasm, his dependence on the Sox for a purpose in his life, and his bafflement about romance. " 04/08/2005 p.29 Premiere
"Barrymore's appealingly camp-free performance is one of the draws..." 10/01/2005 p.130 James Berardinelli's ReelViews 8 of 10
As I have often said, the key to a romantic comedy working is often whether the filmmakers invest the audience in the plight of the main characters. Do we have a rooting interest in these two getting together? This is something the Farrellys accomplish. And, considering that the male lead is played by the insufferable Jimmy Fallon, that may be a more significant achievement that it appears to be at first glance. Drew Barrymore has proven herself in this genre but it takes a shift of perspective to pull for someone as inherently irritating as Fallon. To his credit, the ex-SNL player hides most of his rough edges and manages only to aggravate when he's trying too hard to get a laugh. His slapstick scenes aren't just unfunny, they are embarrassing. But the Farrellys keep these to a minimum. Fallon is otherwise palatable, and we believe in his relationship with Barrymore's character. - James Berardinelli
Rolling Stone 6 of 10
Cute kills. Or at least it does in this initially promising romantic comedy about Ben the teacher (Jimmy Fallon), who is a Red Sox fanatic, and Lindsey the power exec (Drew Barrymore), who is not. As the stars indulge in a cute-off -- he says she talks out of the side of her mouth like "an adorable stroke victim" -- you realize that Nick Hornby's acerbic British novel about a fan's obsession with a losing soccer team has been Americanized into fluff. Nothing is really at stake -- even the cursed Sox broke their losing streak. The movie is so soggy and anonymous, I had to remind myself that the Farrelly brothers, Peter and Bobby, directed it. It's sad to watch the kingpins of gross-out try to dial down to cute. Swung at and missed. - Peter Travers
Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
Jimmy Fallon is perfectly cast in the role. "Saturday Night Live" veterans tend to disappear into the fourth dimension of "SNL" "comedies" that are usually pretty bad. Only occasionally does someone like Bill Murray find a wider range of roles. Fallon was recently in the awful "Taxi," but here it must be said (as it could be said about John Cusack in "High Fidelity" and Hugh Grant in "About a Boy") that you cannot imagine anyone else in the role. He achieves a kind of perfection in his high spirits, his boyish enthusiasm, his dependence on the Sox for a purpose in his life, and his bafflement about romance. He doesn't know that Freud's dying words were allegedly, "Women! What do they want?" But he would have understood them. - Roger Ebert
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