Lots to like (and learn) in the Yogi Berra documentary 'It Ain't Over'

As Sean Mullin's admiring documentary "It Ain't Over" makes clear, Yogi Berra wasn't built like a Baseball Hall of Famer. The longtime New York Yankees catcher, who died in September 2015 at age 90, stood at 5-foot-7, never exactly sculpted his squat physique and would have been the first to admit he didn't have magazine-cover looks.

But Berra's accomplishments belied his unassuming image: 10 World Series titles, three MVP awards and 18 all-star selections during a playing career that spanned 1946 to 1965. So it's fitting that "Over," at a compact 98 minutes, proves to be such a comprehensive encapsulation of an American icon known more for his ubiquitous turns of phrase - "It ain't over till it's over" chief among them - than for his exploits on the diamond.

Mullin's documentary seeks, first and foremost, to correct that perception. "[Mickey] Mantle was Elvis in pinstripes, and Yogi was Sancho Panza," says Billy Crystal, Berra's longtime friend and an incisive source of on-screen insight. "I think it's quite evident that his personality overshadowed his talent as a ballplayer." Mullin comes out swinging at that distortion. As "It Ain't Over" opens with a ceremony from the 2015 All-Star Game that recognized Hank Aaron, Johnny Bench, Sandy Koufax and Willie Mays as baseball's four greatest living legends, the film cuts to Berra's incredulous granddaughter wondering why her grandfather got short shrift.

The ensuing scroll through Berra's life story efficiently but affectionately hits its biographical beats. Wielding a trove of vintage photographs and archival footage, "It Ain't Over" paints a colorful portrait of a working-class player with no shortage of wit, pluck and self-deprecation. Musings on Berra's humble upbringing, as a second-generation Italian immigrant from St. Louis, and his experience storming the beaches of Normandy quickly ground the larger-than-life figure. The sweetly sentimental tale of how Berra wooed his wife, Carmen, further fleshes out a man often flattened into a caricature, as do reflections on their 65-year marriage.

But it's the movie's position on Berra the ballplayer that justifies the entire enterprise. Crisp graphics convincingly make the case that Berra remains underappreciated. A fawning collection of talking heads - such as sportswriters Bob Costas and Claire Smith, retired all-stars Derek Jeter and Nick Swisher, and managerial greats Joe Torre and Joe Maddon - intricately deconstruct Berra's knack for making contact at the plate and calling a pristine game behind it. His role in catching the only perfect game in World Series history, from Don Larsen in 1956, gets its due in transfixing detail. And Berra's lifelong insistence that he tagged out Jackie Robinson when the Brooklyn Dodgers star stole home in the 1955 World Series makes for a charming recurring gag.

"It Ain't Over" also doesn't shy away from the less glamorous phases of Berra's life. His tumultuous coaching career gets as much time as his decorated playing days. Berra's son Dale bravely opens up about his own cocaine addiction and the tough love his father administered to help him get sober. For all of the Berra family's consternation over Yogi's cartoonish public image, there's still fun to be had as those closest to him - and, in amusing archival interviews, Berra himself - struggle to decipher his Yogi-isms. (For the uninitiated, he also coined the phrases, "It's deja vu all over again," "If you can't imitate him, don't copy him," and "When you come to a fork in the road, take it.")

A clever framing device places Berra's sayings alongside comparable pearls of wisdom from the likes of William Shakespeare, Plato and Albert Einstein. Berra's advice, of course, tends to be dizzyingly contradictory but deceptively simple. The same could be said of "It Ain't Over," which zips through Berra's life without ever feeling rushed. When it comes to Mullin's well-paced depiction of a misunderstood legend, Berra's words put it best: "You can observe a lot by watching."

'It Ain't Over'

GRADE: B

Rated PG: Contains smoking, some drug references, strong language and brief war images

Running time: 98 minutes