“We’re a ship without a captain, and there’s a typhoon coming.”

It was April 1947, and the Brooklyn Dodgers were without a manager. Leo Durocher was suspended, and his replacement had quit after two games.

Dodgers’ owner Branch Rickey was desperate for an experienced manager who could weather the proclaimed “typhoon” headed their way. As it would turn out, Rickey didn’t have to worry so much because the typhoon that carried Jack Roosevelt Robinson had already begun to crash upon the shores of the US, destroying segregation in sports, eradicating the tradition of baseball as a “white man’s game” and leaving behind the most influential ball player of all time.

42, the Jackie Robinson biopic released April 12, is the story behind the man who “broke the color barrier” in Major League baseball. Rickey (Harrison Ford) spends a couple days searching the black baseball leagues before he comes up with Robinson (Chadwick Boseman), and thus, history was made.

Just seven days after Robinson’s debut on the Dodgers, Phillies’ manager Ben Chapman (Alan Tudyk) stood outside his dugout telling Robinson to “get back to the cotton fields.” This scene is Boseman’s most impressive performance as his character struggles to control his temper. Fed up with Chapman’s chirping, Robinson retreats to the locker room, smashing his bat against the wall in frustration again and again. Boseman’s sincere and raw sobs connect him emotionally to the audience.

Casting the iconic Ford added a layer of theatrical talent that balanced the inadequacies of some of the lesser-known actors. His portrayal of complex Rickey is spot-on as the owner uses every excuse to explain adding Robinson to the team, from finances to publicity, before finally admitting the truth to Robinson in a private moment: “It was something unfair at the heart of the game I loved, and I ignored it […] you let me love baseball again.”

My major complaint about the film is that it lacks some character development. After only a few scenes together, Robinson tells Wendell Smith (Andre Holland), a writer for the Pittsburgh Courier covering his rise to fame, that Smith is one of the only people Robinson can count on. I hadn’t even known that Robinson was fond of Smith, as he seemed to reject Smith’s constant presence in their other shared scenes.

The nature of the movie called for painful themes to be addressed: the constant use of the “n-word”; the reality of segregation; and the constant death threats Robinson received. These elements put the film where it belongs in the timeline of history when the US, over 100 years after ending slavery, was still a divided society. It is not pretty to watch, but it was reality.

This movie should not just appeal to baseball fans because it is not a movie about baseball. It is a movie about a time period in history that sometimes makes me ashamed to admit that I’m American. It tells the story of the incredible Jackie Robinson, who is not only a legendary baseball player, but also a reverential figure in the civil rights fight. After all, he was the first player to have his number, 42, universally retired from all major league sports, and the great Martin Luther King Jr. called him “a legend.”