Among the many clichés that animate the bland inspirational sports movie The Perfect Game is the overused device of presenting historical events via black-and-white newsreel, then having the newsreel wipe to the color of the rest of the film. It’s visual shorthand to suggest period—here, the 1957 Little League World Series—but it’s mainly a cheap trick to establish veracity, or at least the historic-esque veneer of it. The Perfect Game is all veneer, a paper-thin telling of a genuinely remarkable story that lifts the bullet points of a Mexican team’s unprecedented run through the Little League World Series, and fills out the rest with stereotypes and rank sentimentality. All of this is more or less business as usual for director William Dear, who has devoted much of his career to family-oriented sports films with a Christian bent, like Angels In The Outfield and last year’s dismal Free Style.
