In the late spring of 1962, Scott "Scotty" Smalls moves to the San Fernando Valley outside of Los Angeles with his widowed mother and recent stepfather, Bill. Smalls' mother encourages him to make friends, and he tries to join a group of eight boys who play baseball daily at the neighborhood sandlot, led by Benny Rodriguez. When an attempt to play catch with his stepdad Bill injures Smalls and leaves him with a black eye, Benny invites him onto the team and helps him improve his skills and earn the other boys' respect.
When DeNunez taunts Ham with his trademark pitch, "The Heater", Ham hits a home run into an adjacent backyard, and the team is dismayed. However, they stop Smalls from retrieving the ball and tell him of "the Beast", a legendarily and large, fearsome English Mastiff living behind the fence. In the many previous years, many baseballs have gone over the fence, but every single one has been claimed by the Beast.
One particularly hot day, the team opts to go swimming at the neighborhood pool, in lieu of baseball. They end up getting kicked out after Squint fakes drowning so the lifeguard Wendy Peffercorn kisses him while giving mouth-to-mouth. The team plays a Fourth of July night game by the light of fireworks, and Smalls observes that, to Benny, "baseball was life." They later play against a snooty rival Little League team and win. As a result, they celebrate at a fair that night, but get sick after chewing tobacco and riding the Trabant.
One day, Benny hits the cover off the team's only ball. With Bill away on business for a week, Smalls opts to keep the game going, by borrowing his step father's prized baseball autographed by Babe Ruth. Unaware of its value, Smalls hits his first home run, sending it into the Beast's yard. When the team learns of the autograph, they quickly forge Babe Ruth's signature on a new ball to be a temporary replacement while they come up with a plan to rescue the autographed ball. The team attempts to recover the lost ball with various makeshift devices, but each attempt is thwarted by the Beast.
Finally, Benny gets the courage to get the ball and climbs into the Mertle's backyard. A standoff ensues between Benny and the beast: Benny takes off running for the ball, slides and grabs the ball and takes off running. The beast's chain rips off, resulting in a chase through the town. Benny outruns the dog all the way back to Mr. Mertle's yard, but the Beast crashes through the fence, and it falls down on top of him. Smalls and Benny free the Beast, who gratefully licks Smalls' face and leads them to its stash of baseballs. The two meet Mr. Mertle, who turns out to have been a baseball player and friendly rival of Babe Ruth, having lost his sight after being struck by a pitch. He kindly trades them the chewed-up ball for one autographed by all the Murderer's Row.
Bill loves the Murderer's Row ball but still grounds Smalls for a week for ruining his Babe Ruth autographed ball. Their relationship improves, and Smalls begins to call him "Dad". The boys play on the sandlot the rest of that summer, and several subsequent summers with the Beast – whose real name is Hercules – as their mascot. As the years pass, the boys go their separate ways: Yeah-Yeah enlists in the army; Bertram disappears into the counterculture movement; Timmy and Tommy become an architect and a contractor; Squints marries Wendy, has nine kids with her, and the two run the local drug store; Ham becomes a professional wrestler: "The Great Hambino"; DeNunez plays triple-A baseball, but later owns a business and coaches his sons' Little League team; and Benny earns the nickname "the Jet" after word spreads around about his encounter with the Beast.
As an adult, Smalls becomes a sports commentator and remains friends with Benny, now a player for the Los Angeles Dodgers, giving each other the same thumbs-up sign they have shared since childhood. In Smalls' broadcast booth, he owns and keeps on display the chewed-up Babe Ruth autographed ball, the Murderer's Row ball, the forged Babe Ruth ball, some pictures of Babe Ruth, and a large picture of the Sandlot kids from 1962.
Cast
Tom Guiry as Scott "Scotty" Smalls, new kid in town, who later becomes a leftfielder for the Sandlot team.
David Mickey Evans as adult Scott Smalls (narrator, voice-only, uncredited)
Arliss Howard as adult Scott Smalls (live action, uncredited)[5]
Mike Vitar as Benjamin Franklin "Benny" Rodriguez, leader of the group, as well as the most dedicated and skilled member of the team.
Pablo Vitar as adult Benny "The Jet" Rodriguez
Patrick Renna as Hamilton "Ham" Porter, overweight, short-tempered catcher.
Chauncey Leopardi as Michael "Squints" Palledorous, glasses-wearing, snarky centerfielder.
Marty York as Alan "Yeah-Yeah" McClennan, smart-mouthed third baseman.
Brandon Quintin Adams as Kenny "The Heater" DeNunez, easygoing African American pitcher.
Grant Gelt as Bertram Grover Weeks, rebellious second baseman.
Victor DiMattia as Timmy Timmons, hapless first baseman, and Tommy's older brother.
Shane Obedzinski as Tommy "Repeat" Timmons, rightfielder, and Timmy's younger brother.
James Earl Jones as Mr. Mertle, former player who now resides near the Sandlot, and owner of "The Beast".
Art LaFleur as Babe Ruth "The Great Bambino", a former famous baseball star player of the New York Yankees who appears in Benny's dream to give wisdom to him on rescuing the prized baseball from "The Beast"
Marley Shelton (credited as Marlee Shelton) as Wendy Peffercorn, lifeguard at the local pool, and target of Squints' crush.
The Sandlot received generally positive reviews upon release. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 66% based on 64 reviews, with an average rating of 6.30/10. The site's critical consensus read: "It may be shamelessly derivative and overly nostalgic, but The Sandlot is nevertheless a genuinely sweet and funny coming-of-age adventure".[6]Metacritic assigned the film had a weighted average score of 55 based on 27 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[7] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.[8]
Critic Roger Ebert gave the film three (out of four) stars, comparing the film to a summertime version of A Christmas Story, based on the tone and narration of both films: "There was a moment in the film when Rodriguez hit a line drive directly at the pitcher's mound, and I ducked and held up my mitt, and then I realized I didn't have a mitt, and it was then I also realized how completely this movie had seduced me with its memories of what really matters when you are 12".[9] Bob Cannon of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a B+, praising its simplicity and strong fundamentals.[10]
Leonard Klady of Variety gave the film a mostly negative review. He praised the cinematography and score, but felt the baseball team did not come together, and that the film, while sincere, was a "remarkably shallow wade, rife with incident and slim on substance".[11]
Box office
The film grossed $4,000,000 in its opening weekend and a further $32,000,000 through ticket sales. Figures for world-wide VHS and DVD sales are estimated to be at $76,000,000. Since its release on both VHS and DVD, the film has become a cult favorite.[3]
Defamation suit
In 1998, Michael Polydoros sued 20th Century Fox and the producers of the film for defamation. Polydoros, a childhood classmate of David Mickey Evans, the writer and director of The Sandlot, claimed that the character Michael "Squints" Palledorous was derogatory and caused him shame and humiliation. The trial court found in favor of the film-makers, and that finding was affirmed by the California Court of Appeal.[12] After initially agreeing to review the case in 1998,[13] the Supreme Court of California reversed its decision, dismissing the review and reinstating the Court of Appeal's opinion in favor of 20th Century Fox.[14][15]
Home media
In 1993, The Sandlot first came to home video in a slipcase, along with the LaserDisc in widescreen, but later came in a clam shell case in 1994. On January 29, 2002, the DVD was released under Fox's Family Feature banner, in widescreen (Side B) and full screen (Side A); the 2013 repackaged DVD is widescreen only. The film was released on Blu-ray for the first time in March 2013 to celebrate its 20th anniversary.[16] The film then had a re-release on Blu-ray and Digital HD on March 27, 2018, as part of the film's 25th anniversary.[17]
Sequels and prequel
The Sandlot 2 (2005) – a direct-to-video sequel in which a new Sandlot gang is featured. The only returning cast member is James Earl Jones as Mr. Mertle. Evans also returned to direct the sequel and voiced Smalls' younger brother, Johnnie.
The Sandlot: Heading Home (2007) – another direct-to-video sequel starring Luke Perry as Tommy "Santa" Santorelli who gets knocked back to 1976 from 2004 and relives his childhood. Chauncey Leopardi reprises his role as Squints.
In 2019, a TV series with the original cast was in the works for Disney+,[19][20] as a result of Disney's acquisition of 20th Century Fox.[21] In November 2023, the series was cancelled due to the lengthy SAG-AFTRA strike.[22]
Soundtrack
The film's original score was composed by David Newman, and was not released until 2006, when a limited edition was released as part of the Varèse Sarabande CD Club. This release paired it with selections from Newman's score for The War of the Roses.[23] Subsequently, in 2018 a remastered and expanded limited edition re-issue of the original motion picture score was published by La-La Land Records in observance of the film's 25th anniversary.[24]
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