Ty Roberts’ inspirational sports drama You Gotta Believe relies on age-old playbooks to a fault. It’s a true story and a surefire tear-jerker, but Lane Garrison’s screenplay is reductively hokey at the worst times. Fort Worth’s Westside All-Stars defied the odds in 2002, dedicating their miraculous season to first basemen Robert Ratliff’s terminally ill father, Bobby. It’s an ode to tragedy, hope, and the romanticized salvation of organized sports — yet You Gotta Believe never transcends the glossy barrier between authentic underdog hype and manufactured emotionality. Even worse, Roberts’ direction during in-game baseball sequences spasticly cuts between unwanted camera techniques to hide bafflingly poor gameplay. An odd bug while spotlighting ballplayers.
What Is ‘You Gotta Believe’ About?
Luke Wilson stars as Bobby Ratliff, a loving father diagnosed with an advanced brain tumor right after his son’s Little League team finishes dead last. At the same time, Bobby’s assistant coach and best friend, Jon Kelly (Greg Kinnear), is offered the opportunity to have their losing team represent Fort Worth in the Little League World Series. Bobby loves watching his son Robert (Michael Cash) play baseball, so Jon accepts and starts training his misfit players for a Williamsport run. The odds are against them, but if Bobby’s willing to fight for his life, his team is willing to fight just as hard to win it all.
The Miracle on Ice. Yordan Alvarez’s walk-off home run in Game 1 of the 2022 ALDS. Stefon Diggs’ Minneapolis Miracle. You can’t script better drama in sports than reality — and You Gotta Believe is a prime example. The archived reporting around Bobby Ratliff’s support from the stands while dying from melanoma is where his story’s poignancy exists. Roberts and Garrison platform that tremendous example of insurmountable spirit in theatrical scenes, and while it’s an honor I’m sure the Ratliffs cherish, along with Fort Worth’s grown-up roster, Roberts’ recreations feel like just another Hallmark tissue-destroyer. It’s so brutally by the books in terms of pacing, tone, and themes, to the point where it seems factory-assembled to make audiences cry.
Frustratingly, You Gotta Believe does demonstrate flickers of an appealing family drama with a softer, comforting perspective on death. Cash and his pipsqueak castmates joke about hot sisters and Ichiro playing cards with All-American boyishness. Roberts’ vision is squeaky-clean, which can be lovable, as Jon’s wife Kathy (Molly Parker) bucks his funk by pushing him into their inground pool, or how Bobby’s wife Patti (Sarah Gadon) becomes the steadfast rock of the Ratliff household. Dialogue sometimes reflects adolescent insults written by adults who forgot how to be kids, like “Your pitcher throws like a string bean flickin’ a booger,” but the odd corny zinger earns a chuckle within the film’s wholesome parameters. It’s like The Bad News Bears without the (minimal) edge, dancing a fine line between Little League World Series propaganda and age-appropriate grief training.
‘You Gotta Believe’ Is Too Cheesy For Its Own Good
Unfortunately, You Gotta Believe struggles to justify its blend of championship dreams and trauma minefields. We’re plunged into Bobby’s diagnosis and subsequent cancer battle with breakneck immediacy; Roberts’ continued coverage of Bobby’s deterioration is exploitatively heavy-handed. Baseball interludes try to exist, but they’re a janky simulation of actors swinging at ridiculous pitches, abysmal batting stances, CGI baseballs, and this ugly point-of-view camera like a GoPro taped to a baserunner’s helmet. The film cheaply distracts from what should be a central component of screentime, like a charming musical montage where everyone sings the Rawhide theme song (rollin,’ rollin,’ rollin”) — that’s less charming once you realize the movie just blazed through multiple must-win games. Scenes tend to speedrun through Fort Worth’s on-field accomplishments to wallop audiences with another schmaltzy-as-sin cancer reminder, a constant structural flaw.
Wilson’s portrayal of ailing Bobby stirs empathy and delivers pungent whiffs of morbid courage, but the material itself routinely overplays. Franky, most of You Gotta Believe is guilty of this practice. Wilson, Kinnear, Parker, and Gadon can appear so natural, only for an absurd detail meant for extra-cheesy effects to disrupt organic sentiments. Roberts cannot escape a saccharine double-sweetness that rots our teeth, guiding storytelling toward predictable choke-up points. Subgenre examples like Hardball or Remember the Titans achieve genuine bouts of sadness and never-back-down highs, whereas You Gotta Believe appears artificial. It’s more of a reenactment than a retelling, or worse, an in-movie title that fake characters might watch while blowing handkerchiefs.
You Gotta Believe was greenlit for the right reasons, and I’m glad the Ratliffs have this cinematic commemoration to revisit forever. Stories like this deserve to be shared — but they’re not shielded from critique. Roberts and Garrison execute on disappointing levels that make me yearn for a solid ESPN 30/30 entry based on Bobby’s legacy. It’s one of those waterworks experiences that doesn’t understand how anyone can make a viewer cry, but it takes a special effort to endear the audience while they’re bawling their eyes out. You Gotta Believe is a fabled sports memory told through unspectacular means, too stiff and unfocused to graduate from the minor leagues.
You Gotta Believe is now available to rent or buy on VOD.
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