It’s been said that baseball as a game is a metaphor for life. The only game where the object is to go home.

So, with this summer’s impending slate of movie sequels and repeats, if the chance came along to enjoy a film that reminds us of home and what makes that special to us all, I hope that we would all be able to do so.

From everything I’ve heard and seen so far, “The Final Season” may just be this kind of film. It doesn’t rely on flashy special effects or A list superstars. Instead, it tells a solid story that many of us can relate to in one fashion or another.

From the film’s web site, here’s a synopsis:

“Nowhere was the tradition of baseball's roots in Americana more evident than in tiny Norway Iowa, population 586, where the exploits of Norway High School became legendary. From ESPN to Baseball Weekly to the Wall Street Journal, reporters mused at how a school of fewer than 100 students could win 19 State Baseball Championships, frequently against schools five times their size. Baseball and winning against impossible odds was in the blood of these skinny, farm kids, passed down from generation to generation like a lucky glove.

Coach Jim Van Scoyoc, three time State Coach of the Year and, more recently National Coach of the Year, gets most of the credit. He's a baseball man's baseball man‚ whose look of disapproval can melt concrete. He believes in teaching fundamentals and coaching to win the last game, not the next game.

Young Kent Stock, 24, remembers reading about Norway baseball as a kid. After playing baseball in high school and college he accepts a teaching position in nearby Belle Plaine. Although he plans to marry soon and work for his future father-in-law, he can't pass up the opportunity to be an assistant baseball coach at Norway. From working on the field to hitting fly balls to the state championship game, it's the best summer of Kent's life.

Sean Astin as Kent Stock

As the 90-91 school year begins, Kent moves to St. Louis and starts to work as a bank teller while his fiancée Jen busily plans their upcoming nuptials. But things are happening back in Norway. Bad things. One day Jim shows up at Kent's bank - declining enrollment and increasing state regulations are turning rumors into reality, Norway will probably lose both its high school and Jim, who for years rankled the ire of School Superintendent Harvey Makepeace and looks to be out of a job after the school year. No coach, no summer ball and no chance for Norway to win its 20th state championship.

Kent decides to go back and enter the fray, but when he asks Jen to delay their wedding plans, she explodes, and offers him an ultimatum. Thus ends their engagement. Meanwhile, town meetings become more heated. Polly Morgan, who is there to represent the state, and Kent are caught up in numerous head to head, discussions. The Norway kids join the fight to help save their school, but all is lost when the announcement comes down Norway will close, and Jim will not be offered a position at Madison Community.

The glue that has held Norway teams together for so many years is melting away. The players are fighting among themselves. The team's MVP decides to forego summer ball, if there is to be summer ball. Makepeace and others conspire to let the team fall on its face, rather than prevent them from playing. And Kent Stock, the inexperienced coach, is the perfect sacrificial lamb. A town that has for decades believed in their little team that could, all but gives up on them. It's Kent's task to prove to the boys and himself he can do it. Amidst all the fury, Kent and Polly, formerly on opposite teams, fall in love.

The Final Season is a film about a young man caught in the struggle between tradition and progress - between a future filled with security or uncertainty - and a community's struggle to save its identity in the face of overwhelming opposition. The Final Season tells the story of a team that wouldn't give up. In the summer of 1991 Norway High's baseball tradition ended on a triumphant but somber note and great losses were repaired, at least for one shining moment.”

The Norway High Baseball Team

Check out the web site for more on the film. Also be sure to check out MLB.com for their coverage of the film including clips and interviews including the director, David Mickey Evans.

And if you’re in the New York City area, there’s one more chance to see a screening of the film as part of the Tribeca Film Festival:

Saturday, May 5, 11:00 a.m., AKB-13
AMC Kips Bay (AKB)
570 Second Avenue (at 32nd St.)
New York, NY 10016

And as the film doesn’t yet have a release date, here’s hoping that after these screenings at Tribeca, that a date in our local theaters won’t be long in coming!