Man, talk about a misleading movie description, IMDb says this about Eastwood’s Trouble With the Curve: “An ailing baseball scout in his twilight years takes his daughter along for one last recruiting trip.” Yeah, it’s true that Amy Adams, playing the daughter (an ambitious lawyer in her early 30’s ) finds herself on the road with daddy Eastwood. But that’s not what this movie is about.

This is the story of a father-daughter relationship gone bad from her early childhood, where Clint’s character, as a young scout, fobbed her off on relatives at a tender age and later to boarding school because he couldn’t rear her by himself as he traveled around scouting ballplayers. It is the story of that redemption, but in the guise of a baseball tale.

And the baseball story does have appeal. The Braves have sent Gus to scout a North Carolina high school phenom, Bo Gentry. Is he worthy of a No. 1 draft pick? And Gus, the aging scout is losing his eyesight. Can he see well enough to give the Braves a fair assessment of the kid’s talent? The kid, BTW is really dislikeable and actor Joe Massengill does a nice job presenting the kid as a self-centered jerk. (Dunno how much longer Massengill can play high school age, but it worked here.) That story goes to a predictable comeuppance, but with a big twist.

Anyway, Clint struggles with his vision and Amy Adams struggles with Clint. She does a very fine job as the daughter Mickey, whose legal career is taking off just as Dad's career begins to decline. She’s got to help him, which allows for the redemption story to come to the fore. Adams is truly delightful (as she usually is). The movie is worth seeing for her alone, although Clint fans will love the irascible old man.

There is even a fairly decent falling in love side story as Amy and Justin Timberlake discover each other. John Goodman is his roly-poly self, playing the Braves’ director of scouting and dealing with the office backstabbers.

It’s not a big movie, but well worth being seen by general audiences, including kids. Baseball fans will enjoy it even more. Plus, typical of an Eastwood movie, there are a number of twists at the end. It even closes with the Ray Charles version of “You are My Sunshine,” a song also sung early and poignantly by a grieving Eastwood.

In my opinion the critics have far underrated this movie. RT critics are too down on it, while RT’s audience rating is only 60. I think it deserves better.