Summary Trouble with the Curve (2012)
A daughter tries to remedy her dysfunctional relationship with her ailing father, a decorated baseball scout, by helping him in a recruiting trip which could be his last.
Gus Lobel (Clint Eastwood) is a baseball scout. The team he works for thinks he should retire. He asks them to let him do one more scouting job to prove himself. His friend, Pete Klein (John Goodman), asks Gus' estranged daughter, Mickey (Amy Adams), if she could go with him to make sure he's okay as his eyes are failing. The doctor tells Gus he should get his eyes treated, but he insists on doing his scouting assignment, which takes him to North Carolina. Mickey decides to put her work on hold to go with him, and she wants him to explain why he pushed her away. While there, he runs into Johnny (Justin Timberlake), a scout from another team who was a promising player Gus once scouted. Johnny and Mickey take an interest in each other.
In Atlanta, aging Brave's baseball scout Gus Lobel (Clint Eastwood) is near the end of his contract and manager Vince (Robert Patrick) questions whether or not it is time for his retirement. Meanwhile, the stubborn and grumpy Gus learns that he has problems with his eyes and needs to go to a specialist, but he hides the medical recommendation from everybody. Gus' boss and friend Pete Klein (John Goodman) knows that baseball is the pride and joy of Gus, and a retirement would kill him, and asks him to travel to North Carolina to scout the promising player Bo Gentry (Joe Massingill). Pete also protects Gus from the ambitious colleague Phillip Sanderson (Matthew Lillard) that wants his position, and to get Gus fired. Pete visits Gus' estranged daughter Mickey (Amy Adams), who is an efficient lawyer that is disputing a partnership in the office where she works with her colleague Todd (James Patrick Freetly), and asks her to travel with Gus to North Carolina. Mickey is a great fan of baseball and has a great knowledge of the sport since she used to travel with her father when she was young, but she has a childhood trauma since Gus abandoned her with an uncle when she was a child. In North Carolina, Gus meets former pitcher Johnny (Justin Timberlake), who had an early retirement due to an injured shoulder, and now is scouting for the Red Socks, but aiming to be a broadcaster. When he meets Mickey, there is a mutual attraction between them. Along the days, Gus discovers that Gentry has problems with curve balls and he does not recommend the player to the Braves. He also tells Johnny about Gentry's problem. But when Phillip (Matthew Lillard) advises Vince (Robert Patrick) to hire Gentry, Vince's decision affects the lives of Gus, Mickey, and Johnny.
An aging baseball scout with failing sight hits the road with his estranged daughter to pursue a promising young ballplayer, and they learn just how much they have in common as they make their way from Georgia to North Carolina in this sports drama produced and directed by frequent Eastwood collaborator Robert Lorenz. For decades, Gus Lobel (Clint Eastwood) has been one of the best scouts in Major League Baseball. But these days his eyes just aren't what they used to be, and as a phenomenal young batter enters the draft, the owners of the Atlanta Braves cast a shadow of doubt over Gus' judgment. Meanwhile, his daughter Mickey (Amy Adams) is an aspiring partner at a major Atlanta law firm. In the wake of his wife's death, Gus sent Mickey away, and their relationship has been strained ever since. But she knows a thing or two about baseball, and recognizing that her father's job is in jeopardy, she decides to help him, even at the risk of derailing her own career. Now, throwing caution to the wind (and ignoring her gruff father's objections), Mickey joins Gus for a scouting trip that could keep him in the game until he's ready to retire, as well as repair a father/daughter relationship that once seemed all but lost.
