Will ‘Moneyball: The Movie’ Be A Hit?

Writing in a space that seems oddly familiar to me, Jon Weisman is guardedly optimistic about the box-office fortunes of a certain movie based on a certain book:

What do this month’s Oscars have to do with a baseball movie that is months away from even hitting theaters? Let’s answer by first taking a short trip back in time.
We all remember the reaction when we first heard about the “Moneyball” movie. Near-universal cries of “Are you kidding me?” And that was from people who liked Michael Lewis’ bestselling book, let alone those who panned it.

It did seem like an odd thing to make a movie about, and especially when we started hearing stories about a cartoon Bill James running around (seriously) and various other oddities. That was then, though ...

Ultimately, “Moneyball: The Movie” got a new director and a brilliant writer -- Aaron Sorkin, who’s got a great shot at an Oscar next month for “The Social Network” -- and kept the big movie star, who hung around waiting and worked for less than his usual fee. Really, this is a movie that’s fun to root for.

Will anyone see it, though? Weisman:

As for the commercial prospects, well, baseball obviously isn’t everybody’s cup of tea, here in the States let alone overseas. On the other hand, the movie does star Pitt, who brings a bit more box office pull to the universe than Jesse Eisenberg of “Social.” Further, though few had high expectations for another recent adaptation of a Michael Lewis book, “The Blind Side” earned more than $250 million in the U.S. along with its best picture nomination. If word of mouth is positive, “Moneyball” would almost certainly be a success on two fronts.

Well, yes. But.

“The Blind Side,” while not expected to do anything like the business it did, contained some classic Hollywood elements, and occasionally a movie loaded with classic Hollywood elements will just explode.

As for Brad Pitt, I’m a fan but neither he nor any other actor in the business can guarantee a hit. Remember, between “Ocean’s 13” (big hit) and “Burn After Reading” (moderate hit, amazing performance), Pitt was in a little movie called “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.”

I’m not saying it’s a great film. It’s long, it’s sometimes hard to follow, and Americans don’t have a great affinity for movies set in the 19th Century. But I mean, come on. Brad Pitt. Casey Affleck. Sam Rockwell. That’s gotta have an audience, right?

Wrong. The movie made barely $15 million in the U.S., about half what it cost to make. There’s not an actor in the world who can make people see a movie they don’t want to see.

All that said, I’m fairly confident that “Moneyball” will make more than $15 million, if only because Aaron Sorkin seems almost incapable of writing a movie that a fair number of people don’t want to see. Me included.