The Chris Moeller Archives

Bright Lights, Little City

The neon lights of Hollywood shine on Norway and Cedar Rapids, Iowa later today as the invitation-only premiere of "The Final Season" takes place at the Wehrenberg Galaxy 16 Cine in Cedar Rapids. If you've missed the connection in previous posts, or from the various wire services, the film tells the story of the final baseball season of tiny Norway High School in the summer of 1991. The following year the school consolidated with a larger institution of academia, Benton Community, my alma mater, though you won't see the name "Benton" depicted on screen because their school administrators are chicken. Evidently, some or all of the administrators will be portrayed as the "heavies" in the film.

I was a sophomore on the baseball team at Benton in 1991 so the Norway players that didn't graduate following "The Final Season" became our teammates in '92 in the story that I gather will become the sequel. ("The Son of the Final Season[?]") Much like "The Empire Strikes Back," this sequel would be much darker than the original in both narrative and tone.

Two good friends of mine, and former classmates and teammates, Tim Arp and Jim Schulte, neither of whom have given me permission to use their names in this post, were key members of the '91 Norway squad. Tim played third base and Jim played second so remember these two positions when you're watching the games portrayed on film in your local theater next weekend. I'm guessing, though, based on the movie's trailer, that their portrayers will have been given much longer, Ashton Kutcher-style haircuts to match the popular look of today. Just know that the haircuts that Jim and Tim had in the early '90s were just as trendy at the time.

The movie opens large on Thursday. I hope to have a review posted within a couple weeks, and would love to hear your reactions to it also. I'll attend in either Des Moines or Cedar Rapids, depending on the schedules of friends and family. I'd simply like to encourage everyone to see and support this movie, which stars Sean Astin, Rachel Leigh Cook, Tom Arnold, and "Deadwood's" Powers Boothe. If we don't back it, they'll never film the story of the consolidation of Newhall High School into Benton Community back in 1966. That's just the way Hollywood works.

posted by CM @ 9:45 AM