"The Pride of the Yankees" is the kind of emotional blackmail I rather refuse to be submitted to. Of course it's a classic, but that doesn't say much. Obviously you don't make a movie about baseball legend Lou Gehrig, played by Hollywood legend Gary Cooper, in 1942 when America was the latecomer of the then-roaring Worldwide conflict without the best intentions of the world.
The film even opens with a disclaimer reminding us of the quiet heroism showcased by the "Iron Horse", the New York Yankees first baseman who achieved one of the greatest legacies of the history of baseball (with more than 2000 consecutive games) and died prematurely from a rare condition he gave his name to. He faced illness and an upcoming death with the same courage than the soldiers who were fighting in various parts of the world, and his untimely death was calling for a homage. Fair enough.
But let's not kid ourselves, this is not the pride of the Yankees as team, except if you consider America as the big team. Anyone wants to be a big player in his team and if anything the film - voted 22nd in the American Film Institute Most Inspiring movies- inspires Americans to do is play for their team with the same passion and resignation, it is not about baseball but a spirit. So while Lou Gehrig is getting a fine tribute, Hollywood still elevates the spirit and the pride of moviegoers and who's better than the actor who did exactly the same as Sergeant York the year before?
Once again Cooper pulls off his 'American-of-the-month' image and trading his "Alvin York" overalls to a New York Yankee uniform, as Lou Gehrig, and both would be listed in AFI's Greatest heroes. Still, I'll always be partial to Will Kane from "High Noon", I love Gary Cooper but before "High Noon", his talent was kind of diluted in these noble-spirited roles no matter how iconic they were. And Cooper never looked at ease anyway, towering everyone with the bashfulness of a fish out of water, there was never a moment where you could sense it could be anyone than good old Coop.
But the problem with "The Pride of the Yankees" is in the way it forbids any attempt to be critical because it features a likable actor playing a lovable icon who had just passed away. And right now, saying anything remotely negative about the film feels almost like spitting in Lou Gehrig's grave, while I believe this is a film that should have honored Lou Gehrig in a more baseball-friendly fashion. Indeed, I kept on enumerating AFI lists and there's also the fact that the film was voted third best American sports movie of all time. The least you expect is to have some baseball.
From what I read, Cooper wasn't much of a baseball fan and all the film does is cutting between shots of him swinging the bat, running the base and you don't get more than that. The illusion worked since the only Oscar won by the film (out of nine nominations) is for Editing. Cooper was nominated for Best Actor but I wouldn't get too harsh on him, it was MGM who wanted him and he was clearly miscast. The problem is in the directing which deserves the term of wooden and coming from a director named Wood, it's appropriate.
For a movie supposed to be a dramatization of a man's life, Wood is no Wyler and for a movie supposed to exhilarate the fun of baseball, it is desperately static, even stagey at times. The directing is as wooden as its storytelling, and in case you didn't notice, whatever could be shown through exciting clips is only told from dull standpoints. We got more radio commentary than clip that's for the most obvious, a montage of Gehrig's winning streak is reduced to a series of clippings from his wife Eleanor and the public reaction to his slump is reduced to a patchwork of dialogues between everyday men across American each one having a saying about the matter.
Much worse, the film being two hours long might make anyone except a first act dealing with baseball and a second with the illness when in fact, the baseball is very secondary and there's more time between Lou's mother (played by the hammy Elsa Janssen) and Eleanor talking about the wallpaper or which furniture to buy than anything between Lou and his teammates. And it seems like he developed a bigger relationship with that kid for which he hit two homeruns (apparently a legend) and with sportswriter Sam Blake (Walter Brennan). Did they try to duplicate Sergeant York or what?
And just when you expect the illness to enhance the drama a little, to have the parents learning about the disease, you get directly from the news to the farewell speech and the genuine poignancy of the speech and the line "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth", perhaps the most deserved AFI's inclusion (Top 100 Quotes). Cooper does make the scene work and it's genuinely sad (it was the original speech that prompted Samuel Goldwin to green light the project), this is an outcome that could have worked better with the proper set-up.
"The Pride of the Yankees" deals more with the romantic and domestic life of Lou Gehrig than any other element and what saves it from sheer dreadfulness stands in two names: Teresa Wright. I swear she was perhaps the most talented actress of her generation, a natural, so sweet and lovable I forgot for once that Gehrig was the focus. But I just wished the film was more focused on the baseball and say more about Lou Gehrig than the fact that he was a great man. All we get is that he was great, he became ill, he died and became a legend. For the rest, we still have Wikipedia and documentaries.
The film even opens with a disclaimer reminding us of the quiet heroism showcased by the "Iron Horse", the New York Yankees first baseman who achieved one of the greatest legacies of the history of baseball (with more than 2000 consecutive games) and died prematurely from a rare condition he gave his name to. He faced illness and an upcoming death with the same courage than the soldiers who were fighting in various parts of the world, and his untimely death was calling for a homage. Fair enough.
But let's not kid ourselves, this is not the pride of the Yankees as team, except if you consider America as the big team. Anyone wants to be a big player in his team and if anything the film - voted 22nd in the American Film Institute Most Inspiring movies- inspires Americans to do is play for their team with the same passion and resignation, it is not about baseball but a spirit. So while Lou Gehrig is getting a fine tribute, Hollywood still elevates the spirit and the pride of moviegoers and who's better than the actor who did exactly the same as Sergeant York the year before?
Once again Cooper pulls off his 'American-of-the-month' image and trading his "Alvin York" overalls to a New York Yankee uniform, as Lou Gehrig, and both would be listed in AFI's Greatest heroes. Still, I'll always be partial to Will Kane from "High Noon", I love Gary Cooper but before "High Noon", his talent was kind of diluted in these noble-spirited roles no matter how iconic they were. And Cooper never looked at ease anyway, towering everyone with the bashfulness of a fish out of water, there was never a moment where you could sense it could be anyone than good old Coop.
But the problem with "The Pride of the Yankees" is in the way it forbids any attempt to be critical because it features a likable actor playing a lovable icon who had just passed away. And right now, saying anything remotely negative about the film feels almost like spitting in Lou Gehrig's grave, while I believe this is a film that should have honored Lou Gehrig in a more baseball-friendly fashion. Indeed, I kept on enumerating AFI lists and there's also the fact that the film was voted third best American sports movie of all time. The least you expect is to have some baseball.
From what I read, Cooper wasn't much of a baseball fan and all the film does is cutting between shots of him swinging the bat, running the base and you don't get more than that. The illusion worked since the only Oscar won by the film (out of nine nominations) is for Editing. Cooper was nominated for Best Actor but I wouldn't get too harsh on him, it was MGM who wanted him and he was clearly miscast. The problem is in the directing which deserves the term of wooden and coming from a director named Wood, it's appropriate.
For a movie supposed to be a dramatization of a man's life, Wood is no Wyler and for a movie supposed to exhilarate the fun of baseball, it is desperately static, even stagey at times. The directing is as wooden as its storytelling, and in case you didn't notice, whatever could be shown through exciting clips is only told from dull standpoints. We got more radio commentary than clip that's for the most obvious, a montage of Gehrig's winning streak is reduced to a series of clippings from his wife Eleanor and the public reaction to his slump is reduced to a patchwork of dialogues between everyday men across American each one having a saying about the matter.
Much worse, the film being two hours long might make anyone except a first act dealing with baseball and a second with the illness when in fact, the baseball is very secondary and there's more time between Lou's mother (played by the hammy Elsa Janssen) and Eleanor talking about the wallpaper or which furniture to buy than anything between Lou and his teammates. And it seems like he developed a bigger relationship with that kid for which he hit two homeruns (apparently a legend) and with sportswriter Sam Blake (Walter Brennan). Did they try to duplicate Sergeant York or what?
And just when you expect the illness to enhance the drama a little, to have the parents learning about the disease, you get directly from the news to the farewell speech and the genuine poignancy of the speech and the line "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth", perhaps the most deserved AFI's inclusion (Top 100 Quotes). Cooper does make the scene work and it's genuinely sad (it was the original speech that prompted Samuel Goldwin to green light the project), this is an outcome that could have worked better with the proper set-up.
"The Pride of the Yankees" deals more with the romantic and domestic life of Lou Gehrig than any other element and what saves it from sheer dreadfulness stands in two names: Teresa Wright. I swear she was perhaps the most talented actress of her generation, a natural, so sweet and lovable I forgot for once that Gehrig was the focus. But I just wished the film was more focused on the baseball and say more about Lou Gehrig than the fact that he was a great man. All we get is that he was great, he became ill, he died and became a legend. For the rest, we still have Wikipedia and documentaries.