"Sugar" is an interesting film that takes a look at the life of a baseball prospect from the Dominican Republic. The lead character, nicknamed Sugar, lands in America but can't speak English, the struggles of which are shown to be far more vast than one would immediately think. In fact, the film is more about an immigrant's journey in American than it is a pitcher's attempt to make the majors. This helps the film avoid the typical sports film cliches and really stand out as an original, fresh look at both baseball and life in general.

I think the one thing that really kept me from loving the film was that it was a little too reportorial; its style and the pace just seemed a bit meandering. On the other hand, in order to portray life as it is, let things unfold, and not have obvious rights and wrongs, this style might be a necessity. The film is basically paced like life - it wanders around slowly and then shift suddenly. There was one shift in particular that really left me scrambling. You simply can't go into this film thinking that it is about the journey to the majors; you have to see it as a character study of a young man.

I'd recommend the film but, again, I have to state that the pace is extremely slow. That being said, this is also one of the only films released this year that actually gets better the more you think about it.