User Reviews

I wonder if Al Stump ("Stumpy" to Cobb) realized what he was doing in telling this story, how much of himself and his own dilemma he was revealing. Frustrated because Cobb has final editorial approval of the biography in progress, Stump tells us in voice-over that he decided to do the one thing that Cobb never did -- lie. He would write one bio almost solely about baseball for Cobb to read, and another secret one, hidden away on scraps, that showed the real man and would be published after Cobb's death, which is never far away.

How can Stump make the statement that Cobb never lied? He seems to lie about anything, whenever the whim moves him, including the darkest aspects of his character determinants. Exaggerration, dissembling, hiding or shading the truth, it happens all the time with Cobb. Even about baseball, which was the most important thing in his life. He's dismissive of people like Babe Ruth. When Stump forces him to say SOMEthing good about the man, Cobb allows, "He could run okay -- for a fat man."

It leaves us wondering just how much of the story we're watching is true and how much was limned and polished after the fact since, after all, what Joyce Carol Oates called "pathographies" sell much better than hagiographies. We'd rather read about a bastard than a saint. It's corrupted our scholarship, but never mind. The movie is made watchable by Jones' performance. That's about it. Lolita Davidovitch is beautiful but her part is almost unnecessary. Stumpy combines nicely a particularly kind of Jewish Angst with an equally ethnic tendency to be pushed only so far before counterattacking on his own behalf. (I don't think I minded him as much as some other commentators seem to have.)

The script doesn't give poor Jones much to do except mutate into a Teppischfresser every few minutes, screaming, shouting, laughing hysterically, shooting off pistols, and in general carrying on like some animal in a zoo. He's given scenes that are simply not true to the character as otherwise written. Visiting his daughter's house in his home town, he sits in the car and watches while she looks out the window, identifies him, and draws the curtains closed. Tears trickle down his cheeks, but why? He hasn't bothered to contact her for fifteen years. A family get-together while they sit around the dinner table and trade compliments?

The Cobb we see in the rest of the film wouldn't have given a damn about his daughter or anyone else except himself. But maybe it has something to do with facing mortality. If so, it's not made clear. Still, the most affecting scene is one in which Cobb begins to vomit blood and cough up lung tissue in a motel bathroom. "This is how it starts," he mutters to his mirror image. "This is what it looks like." He might be scared as hell but he's never sorry for anything he's done and has no capacity for self pity.

Some people may find this trait -- not sparing anyone's feelings -- admirable. I don't. Social life is a tissue of lies from beginning to end, and if you don't make some minimal effort to play by this simple and somewhat silly rule of the game -- well, others are liable to treat you as if you had slid into second base wearing shoes with razor-sharp cleats. Al grows to like this old curmudgeon, but let's not forget that Cobb was Al's meal ticket.

The movie attempts to present what sort of person baseball great Ty Cobb was, by showing the last several months of his life, focusing on his collaboration with Al Stump, to write Cobb's autobiography, starting in the summer of 1960 and running through the death of Cobb in July 1961. We get a few swirly flashback scenes of some grim moments in Cobb's life, primarily a few looks at the circumstances surrounding the shooting death of his father in 1905. The only baseball footage comes from one "memory" of Cobb's plus what is supposed to have been an old newsreel biography of his playing career that, for reasons unknown, focuses almost solely on scenes that supposedly took place during the 1916 season. So much of the film deals with Stump's life and activities in working with Cobb that the movie would have been more appropriately named "Stump."

The portrait of the elderly Cobb is not to be believed. He appears to be a drug-addicted (Painkillers) lunatic who went around with his pistol shooting into the air and at walls whenever he wanted to get someone's attention. According to this film, Cobb was a foul-mouthed man who sounded rather uneducated and a man whom all around feared for their safety. Coming from the fantasy pen of Al Stump, none of this in any way describes the real Ty Cobb, based on the evidence of all the people who did know him in his last years. In other words, anyone seeking to learn anything at all about Ty Cobb should look elsewhere.

If you like biography movies because they teach you about how people lived in the old days, this is also a film to be avoided because the total footage that is shown that is supposed to take place before the last year of Cobb's life is less than five minutes. If you want to see how realistic the baseball scenes are—forget it. Not counting the "newsreel" you see one at bat by Cobb, a double, and two stolen bases, each ending with a kick to the crotch with the second followed by a donnybrook. This is not a film about the life of this famous ballplayer, it is a film about several months near the end of his life with almost no time devoted to telling you about all the things he did in his life.

Even in that one baseball game that is depicted, we see no interaction between Cobb and his teammates—not even a view of a clubhouse. We see no manager of the Tigers—indeed, we never learn from this film that Cobb managed the Tigers for 6 years. A large part of Cobb's autobiography, the one he hired Stump to help him write, deals with Cobb's ongoing disputes with Tiger owner Frank Navin. There is no mention of Navin in this film. While Babe Ruth was mentioned, there were no scenes showing Cobb and Ruth on the baseball field, or in a hotel room, or playing golf together as they did. Perhaps they couldn't find an actor who looked anything like the Babe. Check that—after all, Tommy Lee Jones doesn't look anything like Ty Cobb and that didn't stop them.

What we have is a movie with much more cursing than necessary to set the mood, and for no particular reason, there was even a quasi-sex scene that seemed designed just to convince you even more that Cobb was a nasty old man. We know his family found him hard to get along with, but throughout his life he was polite in public and obliging to autograph seekers and others who visited him, especially if they wanted to talk about baseball. This film doesn't even suggest that he was ever nice to anyone.

If you have read other sources and know about the real Cobb, you know this movie is almost 100% concocted by the fantasies of Al Stump. If you knew little about this baseball great and believe anything you saw, you know less about him than you did before. Three times or more they declare that Cobb invented the style of baseball that featured aggressive base running and stealing bases and more, even though that is totally false.

With the simple title of "Cobb," any viewer would expect it to be about the man's whole life—or at least a large part of it, perhaps even the parts that made him famous. Another possible title that would have been more accurate is: "Cobb—ten months at the end of his life." As a fictional film this was a dreadfully boring show about a two-bit writer and a nasty old man who seemed like a lunatic. Full of excessive cussing and devoid of any reason to like either character, it would rate a 3 out of 10. But because it claims to portray a very real man and depicts someone far, far different from the real person, complete with a made-up memory scene of how Cobb's father died—one that Ty could not have told Stump because 1) it didn't happen that way at all, and 2) because Ty wasn't there at the time—I find this film rather offensive. So I give it the lowest score allowed here—a one.

I don't know how much of Cobb is fact and how much is fiction. If it is closer to fact than Ty Cobb was a complete and utter ass. A spiteful and hateful man that didn't seem to be worth writing about let alone making a film about but when you peel back the layers you discover so much more about the man and that's what this film tries to capture. The one thing it doesn't truly touch on is that Ty Cobb was about Baseball...period. I thought Cobb would actually show the baseball career of Ty Cobb and it barely shows some flashbacks of such. This film is truly about Cobb in his final days and the infamous rumors circulating the man and his wild personality as told to world famous Sport's writer Al Stump. Sports screen writer Ron Shelton creates an incredible story surrounding a sport's legend based on the real book written by the real Al Stump (who was also an adviser on the film.) Shelton actually manages to make us see the underside of Ty Cobb. Sure the man is a total lunatic, raving about his younger days and his self imposed greatness but there is a sadness lurking below him, a sarcasm to all his behavior, a desire to be loved by making himself hated.

Who could play this diverse, and flexible character and make it his own. The incomparable Tommy Lee Jones, that's who. This is one of Jones' best performances and he was absolutely robbed by not getting some sort of nomination for some sort of award. He is the only actor who could create an absolute human monster and still manage to make you feel sorry for him, to make you sense his greatness and his talent. On top of that he plays the man dying in one breath and then goes back for Flashbacks and looks convincing as his younger self. He looks sickly and old and really close to death in his later scenes and he just does an incredible job of really embracing Ty Cobb. Robert Wuhl is an odd actor to take on in a lead role in this film. I say that because at the time and even now he was basically at best a supporting actor. I only remembered him in a small role in 1989's Batman. Besides that and a run with the successful TV Series Arli$$ playing a Sport's Agent (which was after Cobb) he was a no-name and a risk to put him opposite talent like Tommy Lee Jones. I think it was a risk worth taking!! Wuhl does a terrific job as Sport's writer Al Stump (Stumpy.) Their chemistry is unmistakable and both men are such flawed characters (Cobb more than Stump obviously) but they are both battling themselves in one way or another. Wuhl also narrates the story and kind of gives us an inside idea as to what is going on in his own mind as he tries to deal with this Baseball legend. Although I wouldn't describe Wuhl's performance as equal to Jones', I would say he holds his own and does a terrific job.

Ron Shelton also directs the film and is certainly no stranger to sports films. After doing Bull Durham, Blue Chips and White Men Can't Jump he really put himself into Cobb. All his sports films are so much more than just about the sport. He brings out his characters and makes you feel them and really care about them and he goes all out with Cobb. You become completely entangled in these two men's lives as they travel together. The film is not about Baseball, it's not about the story, or the trip, or the legends, it's about Ty Cobb...period. Again I don't know how accurate the information is but here he is on the table no holds barred and it's brilliant. It's a biopic about a man that the world hated but no more than I think he hated himself and no more than what he created himself to be. You have to look at small details like his support of fellow team mate Mickey Cochrane, the way his eyes light up when he speaks of his children and the constant mention of his parents and his father's death. I read several reviewers that brought up the point in the narration when Al Stump says "I did something Ty Cobb never did...lie." They point out that Ty Cobb lied about everything and I think that was the idea...that comment was entirely, heavily sarcastic. See the film for yourself because Baseball fans and Tommy Lee Jones fans and fans of powerful biopics will love it. For others it might move a little slowly. It's worth seeing. 8.5/10

A movie like this one just goes to show that if anyone involved in making this movie had bothered to do a shred of research into the life of Cobb, they would have quickly realized that Al Stump fabricated the vast majority of what has become the unfortunate long held beliefs about Cobb. It's too bad that no one looked any further than his book and just ran with it as Gospel.

Al Stump has been largely discredited due to these fabrications, false statements, forgeries and sensationalizing events in Cobb's life to cast him in an unflattering light. This movie hones in on them and magnifies them.

To start with the small stuff, Cobb was not, as commonly believed, a dirty player - and this is according to men he played against. He was tough, rough, and an agitator, but he never "sharpened his spikes" as legend (and the film) attest. Nor did he pistol-whip blacks for no reason. Nor was he a raging racist (he said that blacks should be allowed to play ball wholeheartedly).

If you want to know the true Ty Cobb, the one that Al Stump threw into the dustbin in favor of his fabrication, read "A Terrible Beauty" by Charles Leerhsen. HE did some actual research. It's a shame that people as bright as Ron Shelton (director) and Ken Burns (Baseball mini-series) never took the time to investigate any of Stump's wild accusations.

I first saw this movie some 20 years ago and thought what most people probably thought, that Cobb was an amazing ballplayer, and a half-crazy racist. Yet I recently read George Leershen's book 'Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty' and my opinion has definitely been swayed. Mr. Leershen researched Cobb like no other and discovered that much of the things said and written about him (most notably by Al Stump's and his book that the film was based on) were untrue or wildly exaggerated. Cobb never killed a man, he wasn't a racist (in fact his Father, Grandfather AND Great Grandfather were abolitionists if nothing else), he never sharpened his spikes, and never went out of his way to use them on somebody, unless they were in his path to the base. Even that famous picture of him flying airborne into what looks like the crotch of the catcher, was really him knocking the ball out of his glove, which he did, confirmed by the catcher himself. Al Stump was a notorious liar and fabricator who's 'Tale' of Ty Cobb didn't nearly add up to all of Leershen research or even Cobb's Grandson's first hand knowledge of Ty's place in Tahoe, both know more of truth than what Stump was willing to write about, for the sake of telling the story he wanted for the sole interests of making money, which is why he waited until AFTER Cobb died to release it.

Now all that being said, was Cobb an Angel? Absolutely not, but let's look at the facts of what we know for sure. Cobb was relentlessly Hazed by other players before and after his Mother killed his Father mere weeks before his professional debut at 18 years old. And most baseball players back then were poorly educated, alcoholic thugs. Take a look at some of those early Detroit Tiger team photos that Cobb played on, never before does 'A picture speak a thousand words' or hold more truth than some of the faces and personalities you'll see he came up playing with. Cobb himself was educated and liked to read, yet he also loved the game of baseball and overcame a lot to prove what he could do and that he 'belonged', always playing as if his life depended on it. Many players in turn became jealous of his abilities and 'wild-child' ways on the base paths, which only added to his legend of how he was able to do what he did.

Did Cobb have a couple of altercations with people of color? Yes, but make no mistake he had WAY more altercations with whites. Cobb didn't hate black people, I don't even think Cobb hated anybody, but if you got in his way or went up against him, he would have something to prove, black, white or even a handicapped guy in the stands in a wheel chair missing a few fingers. Apparently that heckler in question was pretty famous for it, and had been laying into Cobb whenever he came into town for a while until finally Cobb snapped and went up into the stands to shut him up once and for all. Does anybody know what the guy said to Cobb? Not sure, but you could easily imagine a couple of sore spots in Cobb's life that would potentially set him off. If you add what Cobb endured and had to overcome from others and it explains his behavior a little better. It by no means gives him a free pass, but it put things in a different context.

People love to knock other people, and in case you didn't notice, this goes on today more than ever, in newspapers and social media etc. Ty Cobb was in a league of his own and people either loved or hated him for it. Al Stump took some random stories handed down through the years, twisted them into what he wanted while adding some of his own BS and turned it into a book he thought would sell.. And then they made a movie from THAT book?! Cobb could be a lot of unpleasant things at times, but he too was once an innocent baby who eventually got molded into the man who became one of the greatest to ever play baseball, but at a price. Without the hazing or his Father's untimely death, who knows if those demons would have pushed him to that same greatness? Let alone becoming the ornery, temperamental man he was? A Terrible Beauty Indeed.