How do you cope with entering your own seventh round of life – AKA middle age? According to cinematographer Carson Lunddirectorial debut”Eephus”, it is best to leave it all on the baseball field.
“Eephus”, which debuted in the 2024 Directors’ Fortnight in Cannes, revolves around a final game at a small ballpark in Massachusetts before its demolition in the 1990s. The recreational league of gamers clings to their passions and friendships, despite the impending end of an era.
The legendary documentary Frederick Wiseman plays a radio station i filmand real-life Boston Red Sox pitcher Bill “Spaceman” Lee has a cameo. “Uncut Gems” stars Keith William Richards and Wayne Diamond, as well as Cliff Blake, Ray Hryb, Stephen Radochia, David Pridemore, Pete Minkarah and David Torres Jr. Lund wrote the script together with Michael Basta and Nate Fisher.
Lund shared in one press release that he created “Eephus” in the “grand cinematic tradition of ‘hangout’ movies that celebrate the humanistic and experiential dimensions of the sport of baseball rather than the details of the game itself.” He cited features such as Robert Altman’s “A Prairie Home Companion” and Howard Hawks’ “Hatari!” as tonal influences.
In addition to writing and directing “Eephus”, Lund also recently served as director of photography at “Christmas Eve at Miller’s Point,” Tyler Taormina’s Christmas drama that debuted at Cannes as well. Taormina also produces “Eephus” together with Lund, Basta and David Entin.
Both projects were produced through Omnes Films, a Los Angeles-based filmmaking collective that describes itself as committed to making “passionate, ambitious works made by friends who prefer atmosphere over action and study the many forms of cultural decay in the 21st century.”
The movie was one Critic’s Choice at IndieWirewith the review citing how the feature evolves with the very “rhythm of a baseball game”.
“Exposition comes out in short two-sentence exchanges between pitches and longer sides between innings, allowing the crowd to experience the game with the same cadence as the players do,” the review reads. Almost too big to even be considered an ensemble film, “Eephus” unfolds as a grand tableau of how this pastime has shaped generations of men. Lund introduces us to two dozen players of various ages and ethnicities spread across the two teams, but none of the individual characters are particularly memorable on their own terms. That’s not an indictment of anyone’s writing or acting, but a reality necessitated by the film’s larger point: These men show us only the parts of themselves that they bring to the field, and years of playing baseball together have shaped their little platoon into a coherent social organism with its own language, jokes and rules for both spoken and unspoken varieties. (…) That is why the loss of this particular major league baseball on this particular field feels so deeply tragic to everyone. More than just giving up a favorite hobby, each man says goodbye to a version of himself that exists only in context.”
“Eephus” will open at Film at Lincoln Center and the IFC Center in New York on March 7 and limited theaters in Los Angeles on March 14, with a national release to follow from Music Box. Check out the trailer below.
