This movie seems to be about baseball but it is also about sports ethics, passion, dream, determination, friendship, and perhaps most importantly, overcoming racial barrier. Do not forget that this movie is made by a formal colony about its colonial period. Most of the lines were written in Japanese, but they included as many kinds of languages in Taiwan as possible. They found actors that have the same ethnicity as the roles they're playing. The lines are great, showing the spirit of the culture. It is a crude simplification to suggest that this is a nationalistic film. It's as if to say Black Panther is pan-black or whatever and ignore its significance in the history of cinema. This film is different things to different people. It uses a true historical event to speaks about the challenges of individuals, just in life in general, as a Japanese descent growing up in a colony, as the colonised or even an indigenous person in the colonial period, as a man who lost his dream but inspired by young people etc. So much more. If only the studio had more money, it would be able to have nice cgi as the American films and publicise around the world. Its message serves more than entertainment and speaks strong in the future as the former colonies are coming closer together with the former colonisers.
