The Hill Strikes Out

EDITOR’S NOTE: This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, films like The Hill might not exist.

Watching The Hill is a bit of a climb. There’s a constant struggle to remain interested. While it wants to be a mountainous tale of perseverance and the triumph of the human spirit, it trips on uneven terrain. Such stumbles send it down a slippery slope of distracting narrative setbacks. What lands at the bottom is a mess of cookie cutter clichés which can’t reach the heights The Hill aspires to.

Based on real events, the movie details the trials and tribulations of Rickey Hill. He’s a scrappy, dirt-poor boy in rural Texas. Despite leg braces and a degenerative affliction impairing his movement, he refuses to accept the idea he’ll never play baseball. Through a combination of preternatural talent and deep faith, Rickey rises about the resistance of his father and the limitations of his physical hindrances to become a minor league ball player.

The funny thing is that for at least the first half hour The Hill seems to be about Rickey’s father James. Played by veteran actor Dennis Quaid, he’s a struggling preacher with more faith than flock. If one didn’t know better The Hill seems like a film about a Baptist minister enduring all manner of tests from the strains of poverty to the unkind disregard of a lip service congregation who attend services without a shred of sincerity. Perhaps the point is to help audiences get to know this character, but it shows a running problem throughout The Hill.

Narrative events occur in block chunks which don’t always transition smoothly. In the beginning, Rickey is almost a subplot in his father’s story. Gradually the film focuses more on its title character. It’s not that he’s never present, but The Hill clumsily handles the father-son relationship which is supposed to fuel some of its drama.

At risk of spoilers, Rickey’s faith as a young boy is routinely mistaken by James as a sign his son will be a preacher. This sets up a conflict between them, especially regarding Rickey’s condition. As a preacher, James believes it is a trial to be endured, while Rickey perceives it as something faith can overcome. And this could all be compelling if the dialogue didn’t often feel like a Sunday School play. Fortunately, the cast does their best delivering some heavy-handed lines.

No stranger to baseball dramas about folks conquering the odds, see his performance in The Rookie (2002), Dennis Quaid sets a high bar. And it’s safe to suggest the seriousness he brings to his role may have given the other performers a boost. It’s often easier to act when a scene partner is this genuine. Yet, there’s plenty of talent on screen even if Gun Shy director Jeff Celentano doesn’t always utilize it.

Joelle Carter plays Rickey’s long suffering mother Helen Hill. She’s a woman quietly carrying the burden of a family strained by various difficulties. So quiet in fact she barely has any lines save for a predictable outburst prodding her husband into recognizing the error of his ways. Perhaps her overall silence is intended to intensify this one moment. However, the way The Hill is scripted the role could’ve been given to a cardboard cutout and lost little because there’s next to no character here. This is a real shame because anyone familiar with Joelle Carter as Ava Crowder on the television series Justified will know she’s capable of handling an intricate part.

Since The Hill covers a wide range of time there’s young Rickey and teenager Rickey, played by Jesse Berry and Colin Ford. Both performers do well enough, although the younger Rickey is more interesting. By the time teenage Rickey arrives, the script seems on autopilot. It’s main goal by then is getting to the end. However, one more memoir moment needs to occur.

See, by the second half of the film a whole new drama emerges. Minor spoiler warning, Rickey becomes a star-athlete on his high school baseball team, but a bad break spells doom. As such, for an hour, the story plods along as family and friends struggle to raise money for his ankle surgery. There’s a lot of Colin Ford wistfully staring into the distance, talking about his situation, dreams, and faith while fundraising occurs that seems fated to fail. The movie strains to cram dramatic tension into these moments but everything feels forced or hollow.

That’s a consistent issue with The Hill. There’s no drama because there’s no real sense of adversity. Rickey’s situation in real life may not have been pleasant, but that struggle doesn’t make it onscreen. This idealized memoir variation is almost handed everything from extreme talent to lifelong romance.

Despite taking seventeen years to get the film made, director Jeff Celentano basically ends up lazily going around the horn touching cliché plot points. Writer Angelo Pizzo, better known for penning Hoosiers (1987) and Rudy (1993), seems to have turned in an outline for a formulaic, sports oriented feelgood flick. Maybe it could’ve been polished into something better, but no one ever got around to it. Something increasingly evident is on the way to the close.

Furthermore, it’s tempting to editorialize given that playing baseball did eventually break Rickey Hill’s body. With that in mind, The Hill becomes the story of a man who ran unflinching right into the brick wall that broke him. But I know from discussions with others some will laud a fellow for bravely living life on their own terms, regardless of the inevitable outcome. Since that appears to be the film’s point — mission accomplished.

A decent cast does their best to make a preachy Sunday School play sound like high class drama. However, The Hill can’t rise above its own clunky narrative. Too many predictable plot points get jammed in without any style or grace, visually or in dialogue. Those in search of a feelgood flick about overcoming adversity may let this one walk, but this is far from a compelling watch. It’s one foul tip after another until The Hill eventually strikes out.