Review Fix Exclusive: Jonathan Hock Talks ‘Fastball’

Review Fix chats with “Fastball” director and writer Jonathan Hock, who discusses the baseball documentary and working with Producer Thomas Tull (“42,” “Straight Outta Compton,” “The Dark Knight”). Made in association with the MLB and Legendary Pictures, Hock and Tull have created a charismatic documentary that features a plethora of MLB talent from Justin Verlander, Andrew McCutcheon, David Price, Derek Jeter, Hank Aaron, Nolan Ryan, Bob Gibson, Goose Gossage, the late Tony Gwynn, and more, it’s a baseball geek’s type of picture, but with narration from Kevin Cosner, it’s got plenty of mainstream appeal. The film is opening on Friday, March 25 in New York at the Village East and On Demand everywhere.

About Fastball:

FASTBALL is peppered with archival footage of baseball’s greatest moments plus original high-speed 4K footage and motion graphics that unlock the secrets hidden within a ball traveling at 100 mph. While players, historians, and scientists might disagree on who was actually the fastest pitcher in history – and yes, the film does the physics and concludes with a clear verdict – “Fastball” tells the story of the game itself.

Review Fix: What was the inspiration for this film?

Jonathan Hock: The inspiration for the film was a previous documentary that Thomas had made with Davis Guggenheim called “It Might Get Loud.” That doc began with Thomas’s idea to do a film about the electric guitar and ended up as a brilliant meditation on creativity and what Bob Dylan called the best music movie ever made. Thomas told Davis he wanted to do a sports doc and Davis, who is an old friend, recommended he call me, knowing that sports docs are my specialty. Thomas told me that he wanted to make a film about the fastball, the fastest throwers in all eras, and wouldn’t it be cool to start there and see where it takes us. So we boiled everything down to the starting point, the primal battle between a man with a stick and a man with a rock, and we discovered that the soul of the game is right there in the 396 milliseconds it takes for a 100 mph pitch to reach the plate.

Review Fix: You spoke to a ton of current and past MLB stars for this. Who was your favorite and why?

Hock: The whole interview process was such a thrill and a delight – I have to break it into categories: active and Hall of Famer, batter and pitcher. Talking baseball for an hour and a half with Hank Aaron was about as great as you’d imagine, only greater. With Nolan Ryan, I’d heard he was a bit reticent in an interview setting, but he was incredibly open and generous, and to talk about the secrets of the fastball with the greatest fastball pitcher who ever lived… unbelievable. David Price was such a joy to  talk to, such a lover of the game and so relaxed and generous in the interview chair, as was Justin Verlander – both were really up on the history of the pitch, which can be rare among elite athletes, oddly enough. One of our producing partners on the project, Mike Tollin, conducted the interview with Bob Gibson. Gibson rarely gives interviews, and this one was legendary.

Review Fix: Why do people love Fastballs so much?

Hock: I think people recognize on some instinctive level that this is a showdown taking place at the upper limits of human performance, on the part of both the pitcher and the hitter. It’s the rarest thing on earth to find a one-on-one confrontation that requires both maximum power and skill, and we respond to that in our gut. We just HAVE to know who is going to win this battle, and cannot look away until it’s done.

Review Fix: What did you learn from this film?

Hock: I learned that pitchers throughout the ages have had their fastballs clocked at different points in the flight of the ball – from Walter Johnson to Bob Feller to Nolan Ryan to today’s pitchers. So we had scientists turn the apples-to-oranges comparisons across the decades into apples-to-apples, and we discovered some amazing things.

Review Fix: What was it like to work with Thomas Tull?

Hock: Thomas is a true believer in the greatness of baseball and of cinema. So to have someone as the producer of the film be the true champion of the director creatively at the same time was a tremendous experience.

Review Fix: In your opinion, with the rise of the NFL over the past two decades, how important is the MLB to America?

Hock: Even if the NFL gets better ratings, etc., I still think that baseball is in our blood just as much – and I say that as a guy who worked at NFL Films for ten years. Baseball is that constant hum in the background of our lives, the musical score to our summers. Working on this film for two years really reawakened a lot of very deep feelings in me that our tied to the game, and that’s what we want the film to do for everyone who sees it.

Review Fix: How do you want this film to be remembered?

Hock: Thomas and I discussed this at our first meeting, that we wanted this to be THE film that every fan will watch every year to greet the new season. Moms and dads sitting with sons and daughters, putting the DVD in the machine and remembering again why we all love this game.

Review Fix: Bottom Line, Why should someone check out this film?

Hock: If you want to spend 85 minutes immersed in the heart and soul of the game of baseball – not the advanced metrics and data, not the trade rumors and talk radio yammering but the real heart and soul of the game – this film is the ticket. You’ll never look at the game the same way again.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Hock: Thomas and I are collaborating on a documentary about Roberto Clemente, which is due out in advance of Legendary’s planned scripted biopic about Clemente (in the model of “42” about Jackie Robinson).