Movie |
Baseball | Sports
Disclaimer: All content and media belong to original content streaming platforms/owners like Netflix, Disney+ Hotstar, Amazon Prime Videos, JioCinema, SonyLIV etc. 91mobiles entertainment does not claim any rights to the content and only aggregate the content along with the service providers links.
Budget 6,100,000 USD
Box Office Collection 5,700,000 USD
Initially, John Sayles envisioned himself in a minor role as a member of the Chicago White Sox. After working over a decade to get the script turned into a movie, he was too old to convincingly portray a ballplayer when filming started. Instead, he cast himself as sportswriter Ring Lardner.
Director John Sayles was contractually obligated to a running time under two hours. To inspire the cast to talk fast, he showed them the film City for Conquest (1940). The final cut of the film is 1:59:48.
D.B. Sweeney, who is right-handed, played the left-handed hitting "Shoeless" Joe Jackson. He initially suggested filming his hitting scenes in reverse, a process used in The Pride of the Yankees (1942). John Sayles didn't have the budget for such effects. Sweeney arranged to work out with a Class A Minor League Baseball team to learn how to hit left-handed. Sweeney came to feel that the conditions and atmosphere around Class A ball were comparable to those around big league baseball in 1919.
In many scenes, players toss their gloves down on the field near their positions before they head to the dugout. Until the 1950s, players frequently left their gloves on the field while at bat. Because of the danger of players stepping on or tripping on them, and batted or thrown balls bouncing off them in odd directions, Major League Baseball requested, then demanded, players to take their gloves with them to the dugout. They finally complied after a rule change and fines.
John Sayles bore such a striking resemblance to newspaper writer Ring Lardner that he played the part himself.
"Buck Weaver: You get out there, and the stands are full and everybody's cheerin'. It's like everybody in the world come to see you. And inside of that there's the players, they're yakkin' it up. The pitcher throws and you look for that pill... suddenly there's nothing else in the ballpark but you and it. Sometimes, when you feel right, there's a groove there, and the bat just eases into it and meets that ball. When the bat meets that ball and you feel that ball just give, you know it's going to go a long way. Damn, if you don't feel like you're going to live forever."
"[about their opponents] 1st Cincinnati Reds Player: These guys don't look so tough. 2nd Cincinnati Reds Player: Yeah, that's what Custer said when the Indians took the field."
