Bull Durham: Difference between revisions
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Mixing into the conflict is Annie Savoy (Sarandon), long-time resident of Durham and a long-time fan of baseball. A sports groupie, she takes it upon herself to latch onto a promising new talent every year and train him on the mysteries of baseball, sex and life (the coaches don't mind: every rookie she beds has a great season). She spies both LaLoosh and Crash and invites them to compete for her affections: Crash, every bit her spiritual and intellectual equal, notes he's too old to "try out" for anything and leaves her with LaLoosh by default, whom Annie quickly beds and nicknames "Nuke".
Now with Crash and Annie teaching him - sometimes in conflict, but more often than not in concert - Nuke goes through the trials and errors of a pitcher: knowing when NOT to shake off a catcher's sign, the value of a rain-out, how bondage and poetry improve sex, how to hold a ball like an egg, how NOT to think when pitching, how to have actual fun during a game, and which way a garter belt ought to be worn ("Rose goes in front, big guy."). But while all that's going on, Crash and Annie get to realizing that the two of them might be perfect for each other, [[Love Triangle|except that she's with Nuke]]...
Critical reception for ''Bull Durham'' was mostly positive when it came out and was a moderate success, but in the 20-plus years since its release the film has been re-assessed as a full-out classic among sports film: critics, sports columnists, and baseball fans argue it may be the best baseball movie ever.
== This movie contains examples of baseball and sex, and a few of these tropes: ==
* [[All Men Are Perverts]]
{{quote|A guy will listen to anything if he thinks it's foreplay.}}
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* [[Big Game]]: Subverted. In a baseball season even in the minors, there's no one big game outside of the playoffs, and the movie ends well before the season does.
* [[Bittersweet Ending]]: The movie [[What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic|ends on a rain-out]] and Annie returns to her home to find Crash having played his last game, hitting his record-setting home run for another team. Crash reveals he's quitting as a player, while Annie reveals that she's quitting too (just boys, not her love of baseball). {{spoiler|Crash then reveals he might get a coaching job in California, suggesting that managing is his ticket to The Show.}}
{{quote|'''Annie''': Walt Whitman once said, "I see great things in baseball. It's our game, the American game. It will repair our losses and be a blessing to us." You could look it up.
* [[Book Ends]]: "La Vie En Rose" plays while Annie has Nuke tied up in bed and reads poetry to him towards the beginning of the film, and it plays when she says goodbye to him towards the end
* [[Brick Joke]]: At one point, Crash teaches Nuke all the cliches he's going to have to tell reporters when he gets to the majors ("We gotta play it one day at a time"). At the end, when Nuke is in the majors, and speaking to a reporter, he's using them all.
* [[The Cameo]]:
* [[Captain Obvious]]
{{quote|'''Nuke''': A woman's pu ... pussy ... um, well, you know how the hair is kind of in a V-shape?
'''Annie''': Yes. I do.
* [[Catch Phrase]]: To this day, minor league pitchers want to "announce my presence with authority!"
* [[Centipede's Dilemma]]: One of the best examples of this. Nuke has ''no'' control when he thinks about what he's doing. He can't even hit Crash in the chest from five feet away when he thinks about what he's doing. Once he learns how to focus on something else, his control greatly improves.
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** There's apparently one word {{spoiler|"cocksucker"}} you're never supposed to say to an umpire.
{{quote|'''Millie''' (listening to a game on the radio as Crash gets thrown out): Must have called him a {{spoiler|cocksucker}}.
'''Annie''' (sighs): How romantic.
* [[Deconstruction]]: Before this, sports movies had clean-cut heroes, outright villains, and every problem resolved by a [[Big Game]] that saves the day. This movie dumps ''all of that'' for serious character development and introspection, and that winning the game is unimportant compared to coming to terms with who you are. By playing by none of the rules, ''Bull Durham'' is considered one of the best sports movies '''ever'''.
* [[Did Not Do the Research]]: Averted, big time. Shelton was a long-time minor league player who knew from experience how life went in Carolina Leagues. Nearly everything in the movie (including the scene of the radio announcer faking a live broadcast from a studio as they couldn't afford the road trips) happened in the minors when the movie was made.
** The one thing Shelton didn't get right was {{spoiler|having Nuke get called up to the Major Leagues straight from playing with a Class-A organization like the Bulls. Even rookie players spend some time at AAA level for a few games before getting called up like that}}. It could be explained away as how {{spoiler|Nuke was leaving and never coming back}}.
* [[Fourth Date Marriage]]: Millie, Annie's friend and fellow groupie, has basically slept with half the Carolina League right up until she tries hooking up with the overtly religious Jimmy. After just one night, the two of them get engaged.
* [[Glory Days]]: Crash once spent 21 days in the major leagues (what he calls "The Show"
{{quote|'''Crash''': Yeah, I was in the Show. (''all the rookies except Nuke perk up'') I was in the Show for 21 days once - the 21 greatest days of my life. You know, you never handle your luggage in the Show, somebody else carries your bags. It was great. You hit white balls for batting practice, ''the ballparks are like cathedrals'', the hotels all have room service, and the women all have long legs and brains...}}
** In a non-sports way, Annie. She keeps wanting to relive the magic of seducing and mentoring a hotshot ball player every year... but even she realizes she's getting too old for that now...
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** "Don't ''fuck'' with a winning streak."
** Straight-arrow Christian Jimmy gets what counts, for ''him,'' as a precision F-strike when he sees the "special wedding cake" the boys get him:
{{quote|'''Jimmy:''' Oh, my ''Lord!''}}
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