A cult classic.™️

One of the greatest movies of all time celebrated it's 25th anniversary this year. Originally released in 1993 "The Sandlot" has become a cult classic for people like myself who grew up in the early 90's. Now I'm not much of a movie guy per say as I prefer documentaries, but I find it impossible to this day to turn the channel if I come across this movie on TV.

If you aren't familiar with The Sandlot here is the storyline from IMDb:

Scotty Smalls moves to a new neighborhood with his mom and stepdad, and wants to learn to play baseball. Rodriguez, the neighborhood baseball guru, takes Smalls under his wing - soon he becomes part of the local baseball buddies. They fall into adventures involving baseball, treehouse sleep-ins, the desirous lifeguard at the local pool, the snooty rival ball team, and the travelling fair. Beyond the fence at the back of the sandlot menaces a legendary ball-eating dog called The Beast, and the kids inevitably must deal with him. - Written by Dan Urson

So I may have exaggerated when I said its one of the best movies of all time, but don't ask me how Rotten Tomatoes scored the movie 56% on the 🍅tomatometer. It seems like some of those movie critics didn't get to live the childhood they always dreamed of and are a bit salty. The audience score gets a little closer to the truth with an 89%, which represents the percentage of users who rated it 3.5 stars or higher out of 5.

Do yourself a favor and don't take their word for it or mine. Instead sit down and watch the movie especially if you have kids who have never seen it.

The Effects of Nostalgia. ⚾

I believe the reason myself and many others from my generation connected with the movie is because we were the kids spending all our summer days playing baseball with our neighborhood friends. From sunup to sundown we were outside in the field doing our best to imitate the professional players we would watch on TV in the evenings.

Even as adults my circle of friends and I still use popular quotes from the film from time to time when speaking to each other. Here are some of the ones you have probably heard before that may help jog your memory:

• You're killing me, Smalls!
• You play ball like a giiirrrrrrrrl!
• For-ev-ver! For-ev-ver! For-ev-ver! For-ev-ver!
• I don't know. Some lady gave it to him. She even signed her name on it. Some lady named... Ruth. Baby Ruth.
• I've been coming here every summer of my adult life, and every summer there she is oiling and lotioning, lotioning and oiling... smiling. I can't take this no more!
• Come on, Benny. Man. The kid is a... L, 7, Weenie!
• Remember kid, there's heroes and there's legends. Heroes get remembered but legends never die, follow your heart kid, and you'll never go wrong.

Any of those ring a bell? If you haven't heard, "You're killing me, Smalls" before then you may want to confirm that you aren't living under a rock.

Naturally you can imagine I was excited when I found out today that 20th Century Fox currently has The Sandlot prequel in development. So far not much detail has been released except that the original writer/director David Mickey Evans will take on the same duties alongside writer Austin Reynolds. Who knows what the plot will consist of or how it will tie into the original, but none of that information is needed as I'm already excited!