The Glove

Tone & Style: Enchanting time travel thriller centered on two star-crossed teens from different generations who fall in love during the last summer of innocence before America plunges into WWII. And while the tone is warm and comedic, there are many tense moments of life-threatening danger and incredible courage and bravery. The stakes are high, the passions are intense and the pace never lets up in this rollicking and unpredictable story world filled with historical icons, Nazi spies, big band music and thrilling baseball action that takes us onto the field of America's most beloved ballpark. The antic adventures of BACK TO THE FUTURE, the time travel meet-your heroes of MIDNIGHT IN PARIS, the old school baseball of FIELD OF DREAMS and THE NATURAL and the heartbreaking tension of CASABLANCA combine in a highly cinematic and gripping tale of a young man's deeply emotional journey as the struggles to fit into an unfamiliar time, keep his knowledge of the future a secret and hang onto a love he can't bear to lose. Story Overview: World War II is raging. Japan has conquered Asia and Hitler has swallowed Europe. But things are different in America. Everybody's jitterbuggin'. The Red Sox and the Yankees are slugging it out. THE PHILADELPHIA STORY is knockin' 'em dead. The cars are hot and the fashions are fabulous. But the good times are about to end. Pearl Harbor is on the horizon. And in this last summer of innocence, two kids from different worlds are about to grow up fast. 17 year-old Matt Allison ends his junior year with a bang, making a dazzling play at shortstop to win the East Bay Championship and getting an A+ on his term paper about the Origins of World War II. But his teacher warns him not to slack off senior year, thinking he’s a lock for Harvard. The death of his father a year ago has left a huge hole in Matt’s life, and he sometimes gets lazy without his Dad around to push him. Matt’s now-single Mom, an Archeology Professor, gives Matt a debit card and a thousand dollars in cash before heading to Belize on a dig and Matt flies to Boston to spend the summer with his Grandma, whose old Victorian house in Brookline reminds him of CLUE. Suddenly strange things start happening. An old woman at a yard sale down the street gives Matt an old split-fingered baseball glove like it’s the most precious thing in the world. The next day, Matt’s Dad calls to him from an old floor-standing mirror and desperate to reunite, Matt steps through the mirror and suddenly finds himself in 1941. Grandma’s house is all boarded up and having no idea what’s happened, Matt bumps into the irrepressible Nell Curley, 17, a whirlwind bobby-soxer who knows more about baseball than anyone on the planet. The kids get off to a comically awkward start, and like any 1941 girl worth her salt, Nell grills Matt about big bands and ballplayers in a jazzy slang Matt barely understands. And when Matt struggles to answer even the simplest questions, Nell blows him off. Panicked and desperate and with nowhere else to turn, Matt shows Nell his modern money, debit card and 2024 driver’s license, convinces her he’s from the future, says he’s a ballplayer and a drummer and begs for her help. Nell’s prayers have been answered! The Gods of Hollywood have smiled! So Nell does exactly what Hepburn would do and buys Matt a haircut, kits him out in her brother’s clothes and cons her father, the former Mayor of Boston, into letting Matt stay for the summer. Problem solved! With no way home and nothing left to lose, Matt plunges headlong into Nell’s magical world of big bands, soda shops, fast cars and Fenway Park. And boy, it’s a doozy. Hamburgers and milkshakes for a dime. “Citizen Kane” at the theater. People on the street in suits and hats. “Buck Rogers” on the radio and Basie 78s on the Victrola. Nell drives her 1940 Plymouth “Hepmobile” convertible like a maniac and smokes Camels like a chimney. And when Nell’s ex-boyfriend Billy Connelly makes an unwanted pass at a country club dance, Matt decks him, Nell swoons and the two star-crossed teens fall hopelessly in love. Nell’s a Fenway fixture who knows everyone and Matt’s thunderstruck when he meets a retired Babe Ruth, who bets Joe DiMaggio $100 he can’t hit one past Matt during batting practice. Matt’s stunned that Joe’s glove is the exact same glove the old lady gave him at the yard sale, and when Matt fields everything Joe hits his way, Joe lets him keep it. Soon after, Matt’s rattled when he meets young Jack Kennedy. But when he learns Nell’s brother is stationed at Pearl Harbor, the pressure becomes unbearable. Matt tells Nell about the upcoming attack and the war it ignites, and if the Feds find out, they’ll beat the truth out of him and use his knowledge to try to change history, which Matt knows he can’t allow. After an explosive argument that leaves Nell in tears, she finally agrees to keep her big mouth shut in order to keep Matt safe. At a big party at Jack’s in Hyannis Port, Matt and Nell make love in the dunes, the first time for both. Matt’s never been happier. But as he and Nell swim in the waves, Billy finds a modern $100 tucked in Matt’s empty wallet and plots his revenge. Suddenly all hell breaks loose. Over lunch with Jack at a restaurant in Cambridge, Nell blurts out that Matt knew about Germany’s invasion of Russia a week before it happened. Under intense grilling from Jack, Matt confesses he’s from the future and tells Jack that one day he’ll be President. The conversation is overheard by a German spy and a U-boat off Cape Cod lands a team of German agents with orders to kidnap Matt and bring him to Berlin. As Matt, Nell and Jack leave a late movie, the Germans pounce. The kids make a harrowing escape and when Jack reports it the Feds, he leaves Matt out of the story to protect him, paints himself as the target and asks the Feds to shadow him so they can catch the Germans red-handed if they try again. Suddenly the Feds arrest Matt for counterfeiting on a tip from the jealous Billy. Nell frantically calls Babe, who storms into the FBI office and says the funny-looking $100 is movie money from a picture he made in Hollywood and he gave it to Matt as a joke. The Feds swallow the story whole and Matt is released. But the trouble’s not over. Matt, Nell, Jack and Babe go to Fenway and Nell panics when she sees the Feds and the Germans in the stands several rows behind her front row box. Fearing they’re both after Matt, Nell plots a daring escape. They sneak into the Red Sox dugout, tell the team of the danger they’re in and in the bottom of the 9th, Matt takes center field wearing Dom DiMaggio’s uniform and Joe’s glove. Matt makes a spectacular game-ending catch, vanishes through a door in the outfield wall and roars off in the Hepmobile with Nell, desperate to get away. A wild four-car chase between the Hepmobile, the Germans, the Feds and Jack and Babe in Jack’s convertible leads to Brookline, where Matt and Nell break into Grandma’s abandoned house and Matt uses his knowledge of CLUE to kill the Germans and save Nell’s life. But Matt knows it’s over. He shouldn’t be here and his only choice is to go back where he belongs. The kids say a heart-breaking goodbye worthy of Rick and Ilsa in “Casablanca,” then Matt steps through the mirror and vanishes. Nell desperately tries to follow, but the mirror won’t let her through. Back in the present, Matt’s heartache eases when he learns Nell lived a long and full life and kept going through the years so she could give him the glove at the yard sale and see him one last time. Nell died peacefully while Matt was back in time, but left him an amazing parting gift: an old manila envelope containing his money, debit card, driver’s license and the title and keys to her beloved Hepmobile. Eight months later, Matt has gotten into Harvard and become a man. And as he takes the field for the start of his senior season, he looks into the pocket of Joe’s old glove and sees Nell waving from her front row box at Fenway, sending him her timeless love.