Hello to all visitors! Please visit the NEW Net54 board at
www.Net54baseball.com
You can directly contact the moderator here if you have any questions or comments. Enjoy!
I saw Pride of The Yankees for sell locally. I've never actually seen the movie. Is it worth picking up? I saw that it has Babe Ruth in it as himself. How does he look? Was he in bad health by the time they made this movie?
Pride of the Yankees was nominated for 11 Academy Awards in 1942 including Best Picture, Best Actor - Gary Cooper and Best Actress - Teresa Wright. Babe Ruth plays himself and appears to be in good health as this is several years before his death in 1948. Mark Koenig, Bill Dickey, Bill Stern and Bob Meusel also appear in the film as themselves. It is generally considered one of the best baseball films ever made, certainly the best of its era. Well worth seeing.
Pride of the Yankees is a must see film. One interesting note is that Gary Cooper was a natural righthanded hitter, so the editors simply reversed the footage to make him appear lefthanded. Even the "4" on the back of the uniform was reversed so it would look correct after the edit.
And the "straw hat" scene on the train is a highlight.
There are a quite a few more recent movies that I would recommend more but for pre-1959 you can also check out:
The Stratton Story (Starring James Stewart as Monty Stratton, White Sox pitcher who loses a leg in a hunting accident), It Happens Every Spring ( a comedy in which Ray Milland is Professor turned pitcher when he invents a substance that makes baseballs repellent to wood), Angels in the Outfield (Pittsburgh Pirates manager is aided by Angels, the heavenly variety not the California American League type) and The Pride of St. Louis (Dizzy Dean).