
Critic Reviews
74
Metascore
Generally Favorable
positive
9(82%)
mixed
2(18%)
negative
0(0%)
Showing 11 Critic Reviews
Mar 24, 2016
100
Hock handles that perennial sports question — what is the athletic limit of a human? — with interesting sidebars about the brain and physics. Such mysteries mingle with irresistible lore in this satisfying work.
Mar 25, 2016
83
The sunniness of Fastball leaves out a lot, but watching it can be as pleasurable as an afternoon at the ballpark.
Mar 24, 2016
80
This appealing documentary makes you understand why aficionados regard baseball as a form of poetry.
Mar 24, 2016
80
You don't have to be a baseball fanatic or for that matter a historian or a physicist to appreciate Fastball.
Mar 24, 2016
80
A film that captures the underlying essence of baseball at the beginning of the 21st century: both humbly wistful and progressively cutting-edge.
Mar 24, 2016
75
It’s a fun film, not quite as lighthearted as the similar “Knuckleball” documentary of a short while back, but amusing enough.
Mar 22, 2016
70
You wouldn't lose anything watching Fastball on ESPN rather than in the movie theater, but it does stand as further testament to baseball's status as our most chess-like sport, and one that, even when broken down to its tiniest component parts, never loses its magic.
Mar 25, 2016
70
It’s never dull. Without destroying the sheer poetry of the matchup between the pitcher’s mound and home plate, Hock explains it all, and in the process pays tribute to the extraordinary speed factor of a game that has been damned for its slowness.
Mar 23, 2016
50
There’s nothing here that wouldn’t have fit comfortably into an hour-long TV special, and it starts to drag after a while.