Bang the Drum Slowly

Plot synopsis:
Henry Wiggen (Moriarty) is a star pitcher for the New York Mammoths, a fictitious Major League Baseball team. He is a valuable player to his manager Dutch but is in a dispute with the team's ownership, holding out for a new contract and more money. Henry has a sideline as an insurance salesman working for the Arcturus Corporation, with ballplayers as his clients. Henry's friend Bruce Pearson (De Niro), the team's catcher, is a player of limited skill and intellect. Teammates call Henry by the nickname "Author" because the brainy pitcher once wrote a book, although Bruce misunderstands and, with his thick Southern drawl, often calls him "Arthur" instead.
Henry and Bruce leave the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, where Bruce has been told he is terminally ill with Hodgkin's disease. They drive to Bruce's hometown in Georgia, because Bruce always wanted his only friend to see it. On their first night there, Bruce burns his old baseball memorabilia to acknowledge the inevitable end of his life.
The team knows nothing about Bruce's fate. At spring training, Dutch is preparing to release Bruce in favor of a hot young prospect, country boy Piney Woods. So management is amazed and confused when Henry ends his holdout and agrees to a new contract on one condition: that he and Bruce come as a package. If one is on the team, so is the other. If one is traded or sent down to the minor leagues, the other goes, too.
Dutch tries everything to make Henry reveal why he insists that Bruce catch for him. In the meantime, the Mammoths are losing games and have a low morale, with teammates quarreling among themselves. Knowing that he is dying, Bruce wants Henry to change the beneficiary on his life insurance policy from his parents to his girlfriend Katie. Henry knows she is interested only in Bruce's money and is taking advantage of his circumstances, so Henry only pretends to change it.
One day when a player teases Bruce, a frustrated Henry blurts out the fact that Bruce is dying. He asks that it remain confidential, but quickly teammates and Dutch all learn the news. They begin to treat Bruce differently and each other as well, and the team's play and mood both improve. Near the end of the season, Bruce becomes too ill to continue playing. The team eventually wins the World Series, but Bruce returns home to see his parents. After the season is over, he dies, and Henry vows that he won't "rag" on (tease) anyone again.

Tags: dramatic

Review:
Both are nice to watch, playing very easy-going non-offensive characters.Moriarty plays a pitcher on a pennant-contending team who lovingly looks after his not-so-smart-but-dying teammate and friend (De Niro).
As nice a film as it is, there is one warning: a lot profanity by the manager (Vincent Gardenia) but it's not a kids' movie anyway.I watched it years ago and then again recently when it came out on DVD.
Most of us, at the end of the 20th century, know Robert DeNiro as an actor who has portrayed countless tough guys onscreen, in movies such as Goodfellas, Raging Bull, Mean Streets, and even up to Ronin.
But before Bobby was cast (and cast and cast and cast)as Hollywood's chief badfella, he co-starred in this adaptation of a novel by Mark Harris as a simpleton baseball catcher who may be dying.Many people feel that playing a sick or handicapped character is relatively easy for an actor, but in truth there's more to acting than simply limping or slurring one's speech.
His best friend is played by Michael Moriarty, whose character is a seasoned, talented pitcher.
Moriarty learns of DeNiro's fate during an off season, and decides to do all he can to help his friend, to make what life he has left a pleasant one.Both actors turn in magnificent performances, but you can't beat this film for an excellent foretelling of a major talent.
Robert De Niro does an outstanding job, in one of his first real big hit next to 'Mean Streets', as Bruce Pearson, the ignorant country boy (you can tell he used the same accent in 'Cape Fear') from Georgia who is dying of Hodgkin's Disease, and Michael Moriarty is also fantastic as Henry Wiggen, the tough talkin' hot shot New Yorker.
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.
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.
Its story is simple - Henry Wiggen, the intelligent and savvy ace pitcher of the New York Mammoths, learns that his best friend on the team, simpleminded, kindhearted catcher Bruce Pearson, has terminal cancer and a year to live.
The baseball elements are well-done, to be sure, the teammate's show a realistic mix of cockiness and genuine concern for a teammate, and the plot involving the manager's spirited investigation of Bruce's off-season activities, not yet knowing he was at a cancer hospital, is funny and realistic at the same time.
However, the reason to watch this is the simple but powerful human drama - the baseball season can't help but take a back seat to that.Aside from the stellar story, this movie is memorable for the acting.
Playing any other character, Gardenia's work here would have been absurd, but his zany acting is totally appropriate for a famous baseball manager, a line of work where flamboyant, over-the-top behavior is essentially a job requirement, regardless of what era of baseball you're talking about.While I don't know if we could ever definitively determine a "best" baseball movie, because a lot of it comes down to personal taste.
DeNiro (as Bruce Pearson) and Moriarity (as Henry "Author" Wiggen) really shine in their roles and have great chemistry in this story about a journeyman catches stricken with Hodgkin's disease, and his friendship with his star pitcher teammate.
Much of the humor in the movies evolves from the attempts of the team's coach to find out his motive.Robert DiNiro plays the dying catcher.
Robert DeNiro underplays the dying catcher to perfection and Vincent Gardenia, as the coach, plays a pretty stock role just as required.There is nothing to criticize about Bang The Drum Slowly.
Based on an early '50s novel by Mark Harris about a fictional N.Y.City Baseball Team (The Mammoths) the movie's focal point is the friendship between the team's star pitcher and a dying catcher, a naive, backwoods boy lacking in the social graces.I'll never forget Michael Moriarty's Henry Wiggen in a scene where he reaches out to embrace a distraught, frightened Bruce Pearson (Robert De Niro), trying his best to console his dying roommate.
" We're all dying " , Wiggen says to his friend, and thus begins and shortly ends one of the most tender scenes ever filmed between two men, in a movie about baseball, no less.
And yet it's really not about baseball at all; yes, there are the obligatory scenes of the team at play and a humorous locker room speech by the team's crusty manager (the wonderful, late Vincent Gardenia, who received a supporting actor Oscar nomination for this film).
The team support and management along with ridiculous sky rocketing salaries and apathetic treatment of sports fans has changed everything for the worse; this sweet little movie touches on a more innocent time.
It was not a copy-cat production and in fact was virtually word-for-word the way the novel read.The second problem suffered by this great film was that it was released during a New York area newspaper strike and didn't get the attention it deserved.Robert De Niro, like many intense actors, often is at his best when playing a subdued, controlled type of character.
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.
When Author, played by one of my favorite actors, Michael Moriarty, finds out that Bruce (played amazingly by Robert DeNiro), his catcher on the fictitious New York Mammoths Major League Baseball treat has terminal cancer, he sets about trying to make his last year on earth as normal as possible.
From the salad days of both Robert DeNiro and Michael Moriarty comes Bang The Drum Slowly, a novel about a star pitcher and his buddy, a dying catcher.
Doesn't attract from the beauty of the performances.Moriarty is the star pitcher and back in those days before big money for a year could set you up for life, ballplayers had to both have another income for the off season and a career plan once your playing days are over.
It's like they were giving two halves of one performance.Vincent Gardenia plays their manager and he got a nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
Which is why we saw Yankee style pinstripes and a home park that looked like old Yankee Stadium.Bang The Drum Slowly is one of the finest baseball films ever done.
Mark Harris's story about a star pitcher (Michael Moriarty) who helps a slow-witted catcher (Robert De Niro) with a terminal illness make it through a season could have been maudlin but instead is intensely moving.
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.
Being a baseball fan for 30+ years; i really enjoyed this movie, it's a good baseball story about a relationship between the ace pitcher and a catcher, the movie features various quirky players and such, but mainly focuses on these two.
If you're not a baseball fan , then maybe the story about the friendship between the two will draw you in,, if on the other hand you are looking for lots of action, crashes , stuff like that,, look elsewhere, this is one of those movies that is very touching to the soul, makes you think about life in general; Robert Deniro gives an excellent performance as Pearson the catcher, maybe not his best performance but way better than average,, the rest of the cast features Michael Moriarity, a small bit from Danny Aiello, and a few others who i can't remember, but all in all it was a good touching story about a catcher trying to help his team with the World Series.
For example, I think the ONLY time in the movie that does get sentimental, is when the SENTIMENTAL singing cowboy baseball player gets ready to sing the title song (brilliant title), and No one wants to hear it--remember Henry with the accent, "AWW, Come on, it's a cawn-bawl sawng", everyone besides Bruce understanding the significance.
Fantastic picture about a Cy Young caliber pitcher, Henry Wiggen (Michael Moriarty), who befriends a lesser known catcher, Bruce Pearson (Robert DeNiro), who was just diagnosed with cancer prior to the 1972 baseball season.
It still has the compelling idea that friendship is the basis of true sportsmanship.A slowly dying, so-so catcher on the team is protected by the ace pitcher and able to fulfill his dream of playing in the big leagues.
Michael Moriarty (underrated) and a fairly young Robert De Niro have a great screen chemistry as the streetwise pitcher and the innocent, tragic catcher.
Underrated Gem. Bang the Drum Slowly (1973) *** 1/2 (out of 4) Depressing but eventually uplifting tale of a star pitcher (Michael Moriarty) who befriends a dimwitted catcher (Robert DeNiro) who is dying.
The thought of watching someone dying from a terminal illness might keep some people away from this movie but that would be a real shame because the film does a beautiful job of teaching about how we should treat people.
This film certainly deals with the topic of death but it also deals with the spirit of life and it also works very well as a baseball movie.
There's been plenty of talk about DeNiro working out with the Cincinnati Reds in order to make himself look like a baseball player and he also succeeds on this level.
Michael Moriarty has a good costarring role as a close friend who helps DeNiro aspire to make his dying wish come true.
A much a more accurate depiction of baseball life than the natural; most of the old movie stock characters are better here-- crusty manager; tough coach; wise talking dames..
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.
Paul Newman, in one of his first big roles, addresses the audience on a darkened stage and explains why "he", (Henry Wiggins, a star pitcher for the New York Mammoths), wrote this story of what happened to his catcher and friend, Bruce Pierson, (Albert Salmi in what would become atypically fine performance), who succumbed to an unnamed disease that somehow didn't prevent him from playing baseball for another season.
Robert de Niro was pretty good as Bruce Pearson, a big league catcher who struggles through one last season after being diagnosed with terminal cancer.
Yeah, there's a bit of a fight to keep him on the team, and star pitcher and Bruce's friend Henry Wiggen (Michael Moriarty) - who at first is the only one who knows Pearson's condition - has to fight to keep him on the team, finally ending a contract dispute only when the team agrees to keep Pearson.
Pearson finally does get sick and leaves the team before the World Series, which they apparently won, but none of that is portrayed - which was appropriate, since the movie wasn't about the team and whether or not it won, but about Pearson.I thought that as a drama, the movie could have gone for more emotion, and I've seen far better baseball movies (right off the top of my head I'd cite "Pride of the Yankees," "Eight Men Out" and "For Love Of The Game.") This one has its moments and it does a decent job of portraying the struggles of the baseball season as this apparently very talented team sort of meanders through the season without really generating any chemistry or putting it all together until the end.
Then again, the baseball team that Robert De Niro plays for is not the New York Yankees.
Similar to the little white lie the movie falls upon us with the New York Yankees, the role of Robert De Niro's character is far from a leading role.
Even the relationship between De Niro and his pitcher / friend played by Michael Moriarty takes a back seat to his relationship w/ the coach of the baseball team played by Vincent Gardenia.
The complexity of his character is so subtle and played with such low energy that it's easy to miss (Moriarty comes off like a poor man's John Voigt).His decision not to let anyone else know that De Niro is dying, for example, is based on his own prejudices and limitations as a human being.
***SPOILERS*** Very probably the best of the slew of a loved one dying of an unnamed and incurable disease movie of the early 1970's Bang the Drum Slowly predated the grand daddy of all those five handkerchief tearjerker-"Love Story"-by some 15 years.
The 1973 movie was originally shown on TV's United States Steel Hour in September 1956 staring Paul Newman and Albert Saimi in the leading roles of Henry Wiggen & Bruce Pearson.It's when New York Mammoth star pitching ace Henry Wiggins, Michael Moriarty, held out sighing his yearly club contract during spring training that it was suspected that he wanted something far more then the money, 70,000 smackers, that his team offered him.
All Pearson now wanted was to not only finish out the season as the club's first string catcher but be a part in helping the team win the league's pennant as well as the World Series.With the cat now out of the bag in what Pearson is going through, in him having a few months left to live, the Mommoth players stop their bickering with each other as well as picking on and needling the good natured and friendly Bruce Pearson and instead get down to business.
This movie,"Bang The Drum Slowly", is about much more than a baseball season.
These are all stories about friendships among men, at a time when those men need those friendships.When Michael Moriarty learns his friend Robert De Niro is incurably sick and will soon die, he makes a decision to give his friend a final season of friendship and support.
Hancock.The screenplay centers on professional baseball player Bruce Pearson and his team mate Henry Wiggen, who supported Bruce to the bitter end after learning that the young catcher was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease and would soon die.
The film is a touching melodrama that explores the inner workings of a baseball club and its players' personalities with remarkable depth.It is sentimental and predictable, but it's also very well acted by it talented cast.Finally,it is good to see a young Robert De Niro showing the talent that has made him one of our best actors..
And even the movie fans look at me funny when I mention one of my favorite actors from the 70s, Michael Moriarty.But there are only a handful of truly fine sports films, and of course even fewer in the sub genre of baseball.
Many a night especially later in the lives of the young when sleep will not come and you're alone in the dark you'll slip this movie in and have a warm feeling even if sleep never comes.The story of mediocre catcher and a great pitcher going through their final season together as the lesser-talented player is dying of an unspecified disease.
Nominally a baseball movie, this is actually more of a human interest story focusing on the relationship of a couple of teammates who hang together through the thick and thin of catcher Bruce Pearson's (Robert DeNiro) bout with Hodgkin's disease.
I'm not sure if a real life ball player could have pulled off the contract demand that Wiggen did by forcing the owner and manager to agree to his terms for keeping 'Bill' employed, but this was made over forty years ago when money hadn't yet become that big a deal.Now I'd never heard of Big League Tegwar before seeing this picture and I don't know if it was simply made up for the story, but it looks like it could be a lot of fun.
From the eye-catching novel by Mark Harris, the narrator and protagonist Henry Wiggen (Michael Moriarty) often used that repeated quote, "Lay it on thin boys." He takes a great caring for his ailing teammate Bruce Pearson (Robert DeNiro)with the insecure belief that his teammates of the fictional team, the New York Mammoths might overdo their sympathy after mistreating the poor man for so many years.
Such is the story here added with the complication that the catcher Bruce, shyly but beloved character played by Robert De Niro, is dying of Hodgkins Disease.
It's really a standout performance.Michael Moriarty is the faithful pitcher and Vincent Gardenia received a well deserved supporting nomination as the suspicious manager of the team who hires a detective to find out what's going on between these 2 guys.Inevitably, the team finds out and attempts to come to the rescue of the stricken catcher.This is certainly one of the best of the baseball pictures as in the case of Pride of the Yankees, it explores tragedy and the human relationship among team players than can develop during such adversity.Selma Diamond is on hand as is effective in her brief 2 scene appearance as the sly telephone operator who knows something is amiss.The one disappointment was that when the inevitable occurs during off season, other than the Moriarty character, no one else attended the funeral..
Pro pitcher Henry Wiggen(Michael Moriarty)and catcher Bruce Pearson(Robert De Niro)are as different as night and day.