Bang the Drum Slowly

New York Mammoth star Pitcher Henry Wiggen (played by Michael Moriarty of future "Law and Order" fame) learns from that his friend and catcher Bruce Pearson (a young Robert De Niro) is terminally ill. Because Bruce is a marginal player and, more importantly, a vulnerable, simple soul, Henry sets out to protect his compadre from the wrath of his teammates, management, and the predators of Life. Upon learning of his friend's condition, Henry negotiates as part of his contract that Bruce will remain with the team for the entire season. He also strives (and this is perhaps the biggest crux of conflict of the film) to keep Bruce's condition their secret for reasons far greater than mere confidentiality. Henry doesn't know what the fallout would be from disclosure, and one of the best scenes in the film is a grilling he gets when the manager suspects that he is hiding something. Henry is also there as Bruce deals with the unsettling prospects of terminal illness. Although the setting is baseball (and writer Mark Harris is one of the best authors of baseball fiction) the story is really about friendship and what a man will do for a friend when he knows that more is at stake than winning games. Younger viewers might not relate to a number of things that date the film somewhat, such a a player negotiating his contract without an agent and Henry's offseason moonlighting as an insurance salesman (yes, players really did do that back before free agency). Any baseball fan will appreciate the footage of Old Yankee Stadium before it was renovated in 1974-75, drastically changing the character of the legendary old park. There is an eerie real-life foreshadowing of the fate of another New York catcher, also wearing Bruce's number 15. It must be said that the supporting roles, such as the team's salty old manager Dutch (Vincent Gardenia), and Bruce's gold digging girlfriend Katie (Ann Wedgeworth), are portrayed extremely well.

Robert DeNiro looked so young in this picture I hardly recognized him and the role he played is unbelievable. This is however, a good baseball film with many veteran actors giving great supporting roles. In this picture Bruce Pearson, (DeNiro) plays the role of a simple minded catcher who was made fun of by all of the team players except one guy, Henry Wiggen, (Michael Moriarty) who stood by Bruce and gave him all the moral support and good advice to deal with his situation. It seems when the players got off of Bruce's back, he was able to hit home runs and had more pep as a catcher. Henry brings Bruce to the Mayo Clinic in Minneapolis and there was bad news for poor Bruce. Henry agreed not to tell anyone about the findings at the clinic and this is when the story gets funny at times and it hits a rather sad note. Entertaining film and great to see DeNiro just starting a great career on the silver screen. Enjoy

Good sports movies are hard to come by. Sure, there are a lot that are pretty decent, the ones that truly strike a chord seem to have been made mostly in the 70's, and this one is included. DeNiro plays a struggling catcher on the Yankees who finds out hes's dying, and Moriarty plays the pitcher. They're two completely different characters who form a bond with each other throughout the last year or so of the catcher's life. And though it still somehow gets centered mainly on Moriarty until the pivotal points of the movie, DeNiro still amazes, as the slow witted catcher with a problem that he doesn't want to tell anyone, so as not to get pity. This is real story with baseball as the backdrop, and that's how it should be done, to get real sports movies.

Henry 'Author' Wiggen (Michael Moriarty) is a pitcher and his best friend Bruce Pearson (Robert De Niro) is a catcher on the major league baseball team New York Mammoths. Bruce is told that he's terminally ill. Henry can be pretty hard on the slow-witted Bruce but he's protective of Bruce especially from Bruce's gold-digging girlfriend Katie. Henry takes lower pay to keep Bruce on the team. Manager Dutch Schnell (Vincent Gardenia) is not happy but forced to accept it. It's a baseball season of ups and downs.

De Niro is still an unknown at this point. The on-screen friendship is fine. They would be better served with more screen time together. The baseball action isn't much. Vincent Gardenia is great although I would have liked some more compelling teammates.

I have been a baseball fan all my life, I have played the game, and I have even been compared by one girl to Kevin Costner's character, Crash Davis, in Bull Durham. I like Bang The Drum Slowly better than Durham. For one, the lines stand up better. Many of Bull Durham's lines are ridiculous or unnecessary or unrealistic. The whole "I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone..." monologue, for example is silly when really looked at hard. (Who would make such a speech?) There are lines in Bang the Drum, however that stand up over time. "It's sad, it makes you wanna cry. No, it sad, it makes you wanna laugh," for example. Even though I have actually had to explain the meaning of that line to one person, I love it. Just the way the players, especially Moriarty, talk, is so authentic. "Not a bad ballplayer, either once people got off his back and let him play." Great performance by De Niro. A good little sports film that will make you cry a little and give you lines that you never forget. "From now on, I rag no one."