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Review: Sugar

An intense young pitcher for a Dominican farm team

By PETER KEOUGH | April 8, 2009

2.5 Stars

Trailer of Sugar

How is it that so many Major Leaguers come from the tiny Dominican Republic? This naturalistic portrait of the young title prospect from Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (Half Nelson) doesn't answer that question, but it does offer insight into the vast majority of aspirants who aren't David Ortiz.

An intense young pitcher for the Dominican farm team of the mythical Kansas City Knights, Sugar (Algenis Perez Soto) impresses a big-league scout with his heat. The visitor teaches him a deadly knuckle curve, and soon Sugar is living with a Bible Belt family while playing for a Single A minor-league team in Iowa.

Boden and Fleck are attentive to detail and the nuances of social interaction — in the cornfields of Middle America as well as in the Dominican Republic. And Sugar is a thorny but endearing hero. He's worth cheering for, but the filmmakers let him down by falling back on familiar stereotypes and conventions.

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