Fusco Fest - The Babe (1992)

Will you waits exist Sis, Welcome back midnight Viewers to fuse Goo Fest. Do we have a theme song? HP? Do we have a Fusco Fest theme? Something? Easy?

We I know we don't have anything. I don't know. You're well, you're producing these. What do you think? What do you want?

Something bluesy? Obviously?

Oh I can I yeah, I can provide you. Remember after we did Crossroads, I sent you too late. I sent you a little blues thing that I had worked up.

We could use that. It's kind of mozy.

Working into a thirty second thing. You'll hear that on the next few sco Fest everybody, I'm keeping all of this in buddy. This is Fusco Fest here on midnight Viewing. Joining me as always is our best friend from fucking thirty years or so now, mister HP. He's from Noise Junkie and he's also from Night Mister Walter's a taxi podcast.

Very very, very very exciting.

I'm always excited to do Fusco Fest, but it's been a while, fatherm alone, so I'm very excited to talk some Fusco with you, sir.

Now so far on Fusco Fest. Hey, everybody, in case you don't know what the fuck we're talking about, but we're discussing the works of mister John Fusco, screenwriter extraordinaire. Turns out that HP and I have a shared love of all of the man's work basically, and figured why

HP.

If I were to ask you, who are the greatest ball players of all time? Is Ruth on there talking about Babe Ruth. Everybody, Babe Ruth.

Babe Ruth. I'm not the biggest baseball fan. I'm more of a casual fan.

Get off of this podcast right now.

Okay, but yeah, I think for the casual fan like myself, sure, Babe Ruth is one of the more prodigious names that you'll hear. And also being from Boston or being from the Boston area, we have our own checkered history with the Bambino, which hate that nickname, I gotta tell you, But yeah, I would say Babe Ruth.

Is one of the greats.

I mean, his home run record lasted until when the nineteen seventy four and that's pretty remarkable.

So yeah, the Bambino not your favorite. How about the Sultan of Swat.

See when you start to give me the Sultan of Swat, I start to hear all the names that Apollo Creed had for himself in Rocky. Give us some the Master of Disaster, the Ayatola of Fistola or something.

I don't know what.

Christ Calm down, Apollo, Okay, so we are talking about the Babe. This is from nineteen ninety two, written as always as all of the movies here on fuscof Has written by mister John Fusco. This one was directed by Arthur Hiller, starring John Goodman, Kelly McGillis, Triny Alvarado, Bruce box Lightner. How excited were you when Bruce box Lightner showed up in the fucking movie?

I was so excited because, full disclosure, this was my first time watching the Babe. I missed it and it's an Ishola run, so I was very excited to see Tron up there on the screen or what scarecrow missus King. Bruce box Lightner very much an eighties guy, so I was very excited.

Does he bruce up there?

I can do no wrong. As I mentioned, James Cromwell shows up in it for a bit. Ralph Morero as ping. I'm only bringing up Ralph Morrero because my late wife Jessica could not pronounce the name of my favorite filmmaker, which was George Romero. She would always say George Morrero. So to see a man named Ralph Morrero in this film, I thought, wow, Jessica would have had a ball. Anyway, this is the story of George Ruth, the Babe Ruth

Where did they come from? Where'd you come from?

Rock from out of nowhere?

To play inside ball?

Hit him when they ate, Well, they aren't over the punches, So that's where I have him. I used to get arrested for that. Now they give me a check from a boy.

He isn't all the bad his life.

Two of them balla Yeah, I know.

You're making more money than the president. Here's three of ballins.

Let's have a hell of season.

He lived his life to make a bottle all rampacks last night, like he played the game, you're gonna.

Do it a son of a gun like that.

You're still a big kid with forty four home runs with the saddest eyes I've ever seen.

I don't even like beings cool, but I loved it watching Sacho run dry did it? Why don't we go to your ride? No, guy, you are incorrigible, Nor.

What babe's gonna sock you a home run? Did that make you feel a better? Johnny too?

That's good?

Well, No, kiddo, I favorite human. He's an animal.

He's a God the man was a legends about way Rock. The legend was real, John Goodman the babe.

Sorry to break in that is I believe that is actually not a true fact. There's a few things like that we're gonna get into, but that actually, it's my understand that he did not, in fact, truly call his shot. He did point to the picture to say, oh, strike one, strike two, but it's unclear whether he truly called his shot or was just gesturing to the picture to say, let's do this. So just one little bit of an accuracy, I have to break in about.

Now, this was your first time watching the film. This was also my first time watching the film. I remember when the film came out. I remembered a bit of hoopla around it. I certainly remember Genny Ande Garoffolo excoriating the film in that she was talking about the treatment of women in cinema and how they were expected to maintain a ridiculous body image. When John Goodman had to lose weight to play Babe Ruth, and he's still too fat.

He's way too big. Because I went back to just to refresh my memory, and I looked at pictures of Ruth in his prime and he's They make him out to be this moose in the bab but he really wasn't.

He wasn't crazy.

I mean compared to modern day athletes. Sure he was probably a bit big, but he wasn't as massive as John Goodman is. And the fact that he had to lose weight, which I think is a funny irony about this movie.

But I thought that was kind of silly.

You know who he reminds me of looking at the actual Babe Ruth, his body time reminded me of John Belushi.

Yeah, like younger John Belushi.

Right, anytime a fat comedian makes the scene, suddenly they're the next John Belushi, because he was the fat comedian. Right. I go back and I look at him, and I go, he's just fucking big. He's just a big dude, but it seems to be mostly muscle under there because he's doing fucking backflips.

Yeah, the same thing goes for Babe Ruth. He was a solid individual guy who could knock the.

Hell out of the ball.

So, sure he's going to be big, but big doesn't mean fat, it doesn't mean overweight.

So this was your first experience, as it was mine.

What'd you think it was interesting.

First thing I did before I even started watching it.

Let me back up a minute.

I was surprised to see that Arthur Hiller had directed it. I completely spaced on that. Obviously, I know him through reputation. Of course, he did Love Story, He did Silver Streak. Do you remember Silver Streak with Gene Wilder?

Of course you do, naturally, Yeah, Richard Pryor absolutely.

And then a funny connection to Our Night, mister Walter's podcast. He also did Teachers, which featured jud Hirsh in a role.

That's right, and I love that movie. I love a lot of Arthur Hiller's movies. Actually, The Lonely Guy I think as an underrated Steve Martin gem that he did. He also did The in Laws for God's Sake with a fucking Alan Alan Arkin, fucking Peter Peter Fowk.

Yeah, it's amazing.

So the pedigree was pretty solid as far as I was concerned. I was kind of excited by the way. Fun fact Arthur Hiller was he used to golf with my uncle Martin. I don't know if I ever told you that story.

I remember Uncle Martin, but I didn't know that he once golf. That's amazing fun fact.

Yeah, I don't. I don't remember how it came up.

He just was talking about some guy that he was golfing with who at the time, Arthur Hiller was the president of the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts and Sciences. So that was where my uncle Martin thought that I would be interested in it. But then come to find out that it was Arthur Hiller who had done all these amazing pictures. He my uncle Martin couldn't have cared less. I think he was just happy to have somebody to golf with.

But that's there was a lot of way, isn't it. Like you see Bill Burr and Star Wars and you're just like, he does not give one shit about Star Wars.

No, but I mean you can tell he loves it and interviews and stuff. But so Arthur Hiller directed. Haskell Wexler was the DP on this picture. Yeah, mate, Wan in the Heat of the Night, One Floor with the Cuckoo's Nest. This movie had some pedigree. Elmer Bernstein did the music. For God's sake, this seemed like a can't miss proposition to me coming into this, Father Malone, and if I'm.

Being perfectly honest, it was.

I had some problems with the picture, which will break down I think first and foremost, if the first thing that I had a problem with was John Goodman. Not to say that John Goodman isn't a fine actor. He's a fantastic actor, but as we just got through saying he was not. So he has to play Babe Ruth from basically age nineteen through age I don't know, fifty one or forty eight or something, or he was like his I think his mid forties when he ended his career with the Boston Braves.

No, I don't think so. He was nineteen in nineteen twenty five, I believe, or twenty four when he starts his career, and then his career is over in nineteen thirty five. So that's what sixteen years, making him thirty seven or thirty six. My math is terrible. Nevertheless, he not yet forty.

Oh okay, but that makes it even more vexing, because John Goodman isn't believable at nineteen. He looks terrible. He looks like somebody who's had a lot of makeup applied. He's too big. They squeeze him into this suit. He it just it didn't work for me, and then you're having him play with or play.

He's forty, by the way.

He's so John Goodman is forty when he's.

He is older than Babe Ruth was. Babe Ruth died before getting to the age John Goodman is when he's going to play Babe Ruth nearly for his entire lifespan.

I'm not surprised because he I thought he looked every bit his age. Because he's playing next to Bruce box Lightner, who's supposed to be his contemporary. He's playing another true actual ballplayer named Jumping Joe Dugan.

And what a great name.

Man. They had great names back then, they really did.

But he just he's up there in his prime.

He's supposed to be in his twenties, and he partially the way he's shot, the way the makeup looks on him, the die that they use for his hair, it just was so unconvincing to me, Father Malone, and it really unfortunately that part of it tended to take me out of the picture. He didn't lose himself in the role. I think somebody should be able to disappear into the

I think he's wildly miscast. I don't think he looks anything like Babe Ruth. I don't think he comes off like Babe Ruth. My problem is maybe that for the majority of the film, Babe Ruth is an uncouth thug of a human being, and John Goodman is just play acting at being a thug of a human being. And

True, I agree because I think John Goodman fundamentally is such a likable actor, such a likable presence, that I think what you said about him play acting towards being this unrefined brood of a man, because we see him do an awful lot of things that we don't agree with. I guess they Fusco should be given some credit for making this a truly warts and all depiction.

Of Babe Ruth.

This is not really this. You could not call this hagiography. This is You're getting the worst of it. But that's also I think part of the problem, because he's so thoroughly unlikable that I don't enjoy spending any time with this character, So that as a viewer, that's a real negative.

Kind of a big problem when he's our lead, right, it is what here's the thing, but Travis Bickle, I always go back to a taxi driver. Travis Bickle is also a despicable character who you would not want to

Where I started to wonder, does he have something wrong with him, something seriously clinically.

Wrong with him in his head?

Because he's especially early on, he's childlike. He doesn't understand

But he does none of those things.

And maybe that's true to the actual individual Babe Ruth, but that doesn't make for fun watching. It was frustrating to me. More often than.

Not, I couldn't understand the point of view at times. There's a scene where he is being shown off by Frizzy, the owner of the Red Sox, and there's a fancy cotillion going on with all these stuffed shirts and he's showing off Babe Ruth and he's told he's given Babe Ruth a joke to recite once they get him up on stage, but he forgets the joke, so instead he does the only joke he really knows as a surefire winner, pull my finger, and he fart's and everyone is just

Or am I.

Supposed to be with him sticking it to the stuff shirts? Like why can't they take a joke? I didn't know.

The movie doesn't really take a side on that, because we're supposed to cheer him for his achievements, But at the same time, are we supposed to condemn his off the field antics, because a lot of that I'm sure is totally true. That he was a womanizer, He did indulge his passions, maybe a little too much. But I just found and actually that was another thing that I found a little confusing. Father alone, is this is a

Around this time.

There were so many movies. There was a little big league there was a league of their own, the sand Lot Rookie of the Year, mister baseball, baseball was big.

Movies, Field of Dreams, Field of Dreams, Bull dur huge and some of these are bona fide major league.

That's which I think is probably one of my favorites, because that's that seems for me, that's truest to the idea of the game and the players of the game.

It's just funny. It's a fun movie.

All right, you might stop, stop, stop before you go further. Let's do it. What's the best baseball movie?

The best baseball mo oh now anytime period or yeah, best movie that you've enjoyed about the sport of baseball.

I don't you are a sports fan, you know me. I cannot stand and sports. I don't get it. I just don't understand them at all. But I fucking love sports movie. Hmmm, research, I already have my answer.

No, I actually I already I anticipated this, and but now I remember my favorite baseball movie, The Natural.

That seems to be a lot of a lot of fans' favorites. Favorite baseball movie. And why is that?

Oh? Why is that?

Because I think it captures, if not the actual grandeur of the game. It captures that, it captures the mythology.

Behind the game. These larger than life characters.

I love the character of Roy Hobbs because he's so larger than life. He's got that bat wonder boy. I think it's called He's he hits. There's something very iconic about that character, and I think it The managers of the team are all that they all feel real. All the actors inhabit their roles as I think they feel authentic to me.

That's what I'm trying to say. There's it's larger than.

Life, and I just think it's shot really well. The soundtrack is amazing. I hate to use the word again, but it's iconic. The scene where he hits the ball into the lights at the end, it's you can't get any better than that for me for a baseball movie. Not in all times sports movie necessarily, but if you're limiting me to baseball, that's the one for me.

Certainly. That shot of him hitting the ball that bursts the lights over the field is one of the most beautiful images in any sports movie ever. I totally agree with that. My favorite baseball movie, however, is from nineteen eighty eight and that's Eight Men Out. Ah, that's a good one, written and directed by John sALS about the Black Sox scandal of nineteen nineteen, which takes place it's contemporary to this.

But what makes you.

Appreciate that one over some of these more sort of popular choices. What is it about eight Men Out that speaks to you?

It shows? Okay, First of all, I love this time period, So that's the thing I really did respond to in the Babe as well, something about those uniforms and that time period and just seeing a crowd shot of men and voters sharing us on. Something about that in the nineteen nineteen early twenties time period is great. Second, it's John Sales, who is one of the best out there. He always has been. We should probably cover him at

I gotta go back and rewatch that. That is a great choice that never even occurred to me. But you're what you just said takes me to One of my big problems with the Babe is that the on the field stuff, the actual ball games, they seem totally disinterested in giving us any sort of context with any of his achievements or any of the sort of psychology.

In any of these games. I don't know.

Every scene that takes place on the ballfield is completely interchangeable for me, unless they had a little text on the bottom of the screen that tells me it's the Tigers versus the Socks in nineteen seventeen or whatever. It all looked the same to me, and it all boils down to him just getting a few pitches, strike one, strike two, Boom, he hits a home run. Every scene

It's the thing that could have saved the movie, if I hate to say it, because we praised him pretty heavily at the top, but Arthur Hiller was the wrong guy to direct this movie. This is a situation where it just seems like everyone who seemed perfect was the incorrect choice. Because Arthur Hiller is a great like with comedy and physical comedy, but he's not like greatest crafter of images. Necessarily. I didn't feel any of the electric snap you get when you're playing sports or watching sports.

This was This is not I mean, if you really dig down deep, this is not really a sports movie. This is ultimately a melodrama about the babe and his life off of the field. And maybe that's shame on me for going into this hoping that it was going to be a sports movie in the more traditional mold, but we didn't get that here it really is. So we didn't get the Arthur Hiller of those other pictures.

If this had been a slice of life of Babe Ruth, maybe like going through the divorce or getting that we find out about his kid, or any of the travails, Like if we had focused intimately on that and just jettison to baseball entirely. Then I think Arthur Hiller would have been the perfect filmmaker for this. Unfortunately, there's a lot of goddamn baseball in it, and none of it is exciting.

And would you go to see a movie about Babe Ruth that did not have at least the promise of baseball action, baseball footage, everything that goes.

Into sports movie.

I don't know that I would have been that excited if this had been billed as a melodrama that covered everything but his baseball exploits. That's not interesting to me. Maybe I don't know, But.

Remember the movie Wonderland. It was with Val Kilmer.

Actually, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, John Holmes movie.

Right where the movie begins and there's an opening crawl which tells us all about John Holmes's exploits in the entertainment in the aldonfl entertainment industry, about how crazy it was and how fucking fantastic it all was, and then it says this movie takes place after that, and you're like, ah, like literally in the theater that I saw it, and somebody went, ah.

Yeah, I was.

That part of it was rather disappointing, But maybe that's just not the movie that they were trying. Maybe they tried to have their cake and eat it too, But I don't see how you can have a movie about Babe Ruth and not have equal coverage given to the baseball stuff, and not have the baseball stuff be super exciting and super kinetic.

Well maybe not.

Doesn't have to be like jump cuts and eighty style, but it has to be interesting to the viewer. And it was, like I said, it all it boiled down to was him at the plate smacking a home run, go on to the next scene.

That it was boring to me.

You said, this is a melodrama, and that's ultimately what it reminded me of. And it ultimately the problem, and I apologize, mister Fusco. The problem with the screenplay is this feels like a biography from the nineteen fifties or sixties. As far as it's construction, it's the life of the guy. So because that's our story, we're telling the story of Babe Ruth. There's no plot at all. It's just a series of events of his life, which is how every

Honestly, it was very conventional in that way.

This could have come, like you said, like prior to the Yankees, a movie like that, which is just the kind of high level view of the of the athlete, and like I said, more hay geography, this isn't this isn't that. But it comes damn close, and it certainly doesn't. It. Just the disheartening part of it is it just seemed disinterested in all of the stuff that should have been really excited at a slam dunk, like the baseball scenes.

It just didn't seem to care about that part of it.

Not only that, but okay, here's my hot take on the movie. Watching the movie and I'm not enjoying it, right, And then we get to about an hour and a half into it and suddenly there's a teammate you just mentioned, the Pride of the Yankees, iron Man, who's a competitor of Ruts. And this is like nineteen twenty six, twenty seven, And if you look at Baber's life around then, nineteen twenty six twenty seven, that's around the time when he hit the most home runs he ever hit sixty home runs.

And the thing with Luke Eereg was they had a real rivalry. They did not like each.

Other for most of their playing game, and they do pay some lip service to that where there's a scene where Babe Ruth is on the down the downward sort of trajectory and Greg is on the upswing and Greg hits a home run, and I think Babe Ruth is just sulking saying, ah, lucky, lucky hit. But they didn't do anything. By the way, fun fact, the guy who played lou Gareg in this movie is an actor named Michael McGrady. Did you recognize who that was?

Father Malone?

No.

Now, let me preface this by saying, I'm going to pepper more of these things. And I also wasn't really enjoying a lot of what I was seeing in this movie. So but fortunately for me, this movie is positively peppered with interesting actors in little, tiny roles. Here and there, and this was one of them. So the actor Mike McGrady was in the movie Back to School. Now, think about the scene and Back to School where.

I know exactly okay, go ahead, no, no, no no.

It's after Rodney Dangerfield does twist and shout and one of the football players come in complaining that some anarchists have like spray painted or they threw paint all over their rally. And the head football player is the guy who played lou Gareg. This actor Michael McGrady, he's the guy who says he's holding Robert Downey Junior by the face, and he says, you call his mother, you tell him he's never coming home.

I said, that's crazy. You know this guy. I was tickled by that.

That's hilarious. Now I didn't even know that. That's amazing.

There's a few others I'll bring up when they come up. But actually here's another one. Rooth's dad, bay Ruth's dad. There's a scene where he brings his son to the school for boys whatever it's called.

Actor named Robert.

Swan, Saint Mary's Industrial School for Boys.

Very bleak.

The actor's name is Robert Swan. It's hard to see, because honestly, a lot of this movie was murky and didn't really wasn't had it was very crisp. But the actor Robert Swan, you know, he's been in a bunch of things. What I remember him from was he was the Mountie captain in the movie The Untouchables. We do not proove of your methods.

I love that guy. Yeah, he was the data. Yeah, that's so credy, you know what, let's give it. Yeah, okay, So that scene they drop him off at the school orphanage, right, Yeah? Did you assume that he was now an orphan?

Did I assume he was? I'm not.

My assumption, as just as a viewer, was that they were going to come back and get him at some point.

I didn't realize.

I don't know how true that is. I don't think that's totally true that they just left him there for twelve years to fend for himself. I think I think there's a little more contact than that. But I didn't assume that he was going to be there for twelve years, which is awful.

Why what did you think?

No, that is what happened, actually, and it's really horrible.

I just I thought his they I thought they had some contact with his parents over the years. I don't know about his mother, but I thought his father was still around it. It's terrible that's not the case.

It's sad.

No, they never came back for him, and I do think they might have had some course bonds, but they his father, I guess, often promised to come but never did.

That's terrible, but no, I guess I just I didn't. Just as a compassionate person, maybe I hoped that they would not leave him there to just let the brothers deal with them.

But sad, you know, they I just Okay. Triny Elvarado, who I think is great in this mission, I think she's doing a really great job considering she just needs to be reacting to all of his terrible behavior and then forgiving him when she gets a gift.

Yeah, she's quite natural. She had a moment at this time. I remember going to see Stella. I think that might have been her one of her first movies, and she was in Little Women choosing a bunch of stuff around.

She was the drummer in satisfaction Baby.

That's right, Like I said, she had a moment.

The Justine Bateman classic I saw that in the theater. Liam Neesen is in that fucking room.

You saw satisfaction in the theater.

Hb up until I'd say, two thousand and ten, I saw everything in the I.

Just said that, having just admitted that I saw Stella in the theater. So I guess there goes my argument, so it's no longer valid.

What's next? Oh okay, So we're talking about Triny Albarado here I interrupted you, and we're talking about that character in particular, who was He was nineteen, she was sixteen when they married, and things were fine for a few years there for lived in Boston for five years, they lived in the back Bay. We don't really see any of that. Time is a problem in this because they spend so much of it, and just giving us a title card doesn't mean a fucking thing.

Honestly, there's not a lot of sign posting in this movie. You're right, you would never have thought that he was supposed to be nineteen when they met and fell in love, because he looks every bit that forty year old with his dyed hair.

Anyway, go ahead, now, look, if you want to do

I read that also.

I wasn't aware of that, and because I'm watching that scene where he brings this child home, and just on the face of it, it's a pretty scary thing, like how can you just bring home a baby adoption? Maybe adoptions were a little more loosey goosey back in the teens or the twenties, but the fact is but you said three or four seasons, three or four scenes before he's bringing home horses to smooth things over. Now he's

And they don't cover that.

They don't, which I think is a much more interesting thing like line to follow.

Right, Yeah, man, this look, the ultimate sin of this movie is it's trying to fucking tell too much. I say this every time we talk about a biography. Larry Karazuski and Scott Alexander figured out the fucking method to make a biography, which is fine, to a moment that person is important, and tell that story. And they could have told this story. They could have told us if want, if we want to know the story of Babe Ruth and his family life and all of this fucked up

It was too much, And I agree Yarzuski. Those movies, Edward.

They're masterclasses and how to do a biography, to make it interesting, make it funny, make it poignant, which this wants to be all of those things. It wants to tug at the heart strings. And I'm just left cold by the whole thing because it just doesn't really it's not adding up for me as a viewer watching.

This People Versus Larry Flint, Karazuski and Alexander's screenplay there that even opens with the scene of Larry Flint as a child, and I don't mind because it's fucking brief. It just like sets up who this fucking guy is. And then we jump right into the story and we get the story from here to here. And they actually do a span of time in that movie that's about at least at ten or fifteen year period, which is what this movie is essentially telling us from nine human

Yeah, it's You're right, it doesn't.

There's no real momentum that's carrying you through this something that is it's leading up to. I think you're absolutely right on that. It just and maybe that's why.

I just was. It just felt inert to me.

It didn't really have a lot of snap, like you said, like a good sports movie should have snap. Any movie that has emotion that has some interesting aspects to it should grab you.

And I was never grabbed in that way.

What did you like about the movie I was thinking about.

I'm a little conflicted about one thing. Decided if I.

Really like it or not.

I'm a little I'm at loggerheads about the soundtrack. About Elmer Bernstein's soundtrack. Is it Bernstein or Bernstein? I keep mispronouncing it.

I think it's Bernstein, So Bernstein, Elmer Bernstein, who I love?

I know, I just hp Did I just ask you to name something you liked about it? Now you're gonna slag off Elmer Bernstein.

No, I'm saying that. I think it's I think it's a good soundtrack. But my dilemma is I don't think it's a good soundtrack for this movie. I think objectively it's a great soundtrack. It has the sort of fanfare of horns. It wants to make the movie exciting. It wants to be to make it propulsive in a way that the actual story isn't. So I guess in isolation, I really like the music because I think Emma Bernstein

Yes, I thought his score would have been great in that nineteen fifties or sixties version of this movie, and that's it.

It's a real throwback soundtrack, which maybe that's maybe I just wanted something a little bit more modern and a little more subdued. But this year getting the like I said, fanfare of horns as he's calling his shot out to center field. It wants to be exciting and it wants to give you that feeling of Wow, this guy's a sports giant. But it just didn't. But I objectively, I think it's a great soundtrack.

Do you know that Babe Ruth had a vaudeville show in between seasons while he was on the Yankees.

I've heard that, and I think the trailer had a scene with him doing his show, but we don't actually see any of that in the movie itself.

I don't think.

Do you know that he was making triple his salary outside of his Yankee salary.

With endorsements and stuff.

Yes, Babe Ruth was a fucking superstar. Babe Ruth was the first fucking sports superstar. He was the endorse he made everything, he did everything, and we don't That's an

Yeah, he was.

I was actually on the Wikipedia page. I think they make reference. I guess he starred in a silent movie, which unfortunately has been lost as many of these. I'm sure a lot of movies from that time period of loss.

But I'd love to see that Babe Ruth acting in a silent movie. That'd be awesome.

There is footage of him. There's plenty of footage of Babe Ruth if you want to see it. Yeah, I mean, he would show up in things as Babe Ruth and here's my friend, Babe Ruth.

Sure, I just I it's just one of those things. I think it would be interesting to see because I don't know silent movie acting, and seeing him do that sort of pantomiming I think would have been interesting because I've seen all the usual footage of him, like swinging the bad and winking and trotting out the bases and stuff I can't I can't get over by the way, it makes me more and more annoyed how big John

I think it would have been more impactful.

When he finally got because the whole point of it is as when he and later in life, is when he really let himself go, and that's when the jeers of hey, get out of here, you too, You can't run the bases anymore, You sucked. That would have been much more impactful if you see the younger, more robust babe Ruth, who could really do it. Let me ask you, father Malone, what's something you really loved about this movie?

I thought the fucking production design and the costumes were spectacular.

I agree.

Actually, you're right, it actually seemed very spot on. The uniforms and everything sure.

And just the people on the streets there. There are hundreds of extras in this movie, not discounting just the scenes in the stadium. There are tons of on the street sequences. He's riding motorcycles on fucking sidewalks and just like running into people, and all of that seems like it could be back lot. I don't know if it was or not. And I think that's a fucking triumph of the movie and the and the cinematography during those sequences.

It looked authentic. I totally agree. It looked authentic.

There's a scene where Babe has he's gotten lost or they can't find him, and finally his second wife and Bruce box Lightner's character find him and they take him to like to basically shower him to sober him up because he's drunk, and Bruce box Lightner is taking off

I totally agree with you.

There now about those uniforms. Do you think those were very uncomfortable? Was George Costanza right? Should we have brought should we have brought back the cotton uniforms? I think we should. The look of them is so great.

It is great.

But wasn't he proven wrong because didn't they try to someone like was it like what the hell's his name? Didn't didn't Derek Jeter like slide into home and because it was cotton, it all basically basically all eroded when he took his slide.

And he got a bruise or something on his leg.

Wasn't that the whole thing where it couldn't hold up to sliding into home?

It's not what it was. I don't know, it doesn't matter. Everyone should be wearing those uniforms.

It they're also very baggy.

I just think that's part of the charm and the look of it is when you see one of those old tiny pitchers do the old time wind up, and it's the uniforms are basically hanging off of them because they're not very well tailored at that time. There was a charm to that. But I guess I don't know. I'm fine with modern day textiles.

I guess, oh, the profile of those uniforms, man.

But you'd want those little beanies to come back to hell.

Yeah, and those big wonky gloves that just are like a real glove. It's just a leather, like a Mickey mouse hand.

I see what you're saying. I don't know, maybe maybe they should.

It's funny because in football occasionally they'll have a game and they'll do throwback uniforms.

Would they have helmet?

No, they don't go that far.

But like for the Patriots, they'll go back to the old pat Patriot logo of the patriot.

Who's hiking the ball.

But I guess my point is they don't ever do anything quite like that with baseball, and I think it's a missed opportunity. If they all have the knickerbockers and like the hat and the old style gloves like you described, that would be.

Great, just an exit game. What would be wrong with that?

I think it would be if it would be good for a few laughs. And I think if it's just I mean, look, they play so many games in a season. What is it, one hundred and eighty two games, like or one hundred and sixty two games? Excuse me, you can't take one meaningless game and just dress them up as they were in nineteen nineteen.

I think that'd be hilarious.

Yeah, there's a joke on Futurama because the blurns ball is what it is in the future, and they say, yeah, oh no, they jazzed it up back in the twenty third century and baseball doesn't need Hey they chested it up.

No.

I like the way.

I like your the way you're thinking on this. I think that would bring a lot of people to the sport. I think, I mean, who wouldn't want to see these guys playing in these old timey uniforms.

That'd be awesome.

I mean, look, clearly, they don't need any attendance isn't waning at the ballpark at these days. But we're getting some here in Las Vegas. Everybody, We're getting a ball team. You are, yeah, man, we're still the Athletics.

Oh so that actually is happening.

The Las Vegas A's they just did. They just approved the stadium.

They're not even changing the name. It's they're gonna stay the A's.

Yeah, man, what kind.

Of sucks the.

Las Vegas Dealers or the Aces or something that would be.

That's a missed opportunity right there.

Next up basketball, Looking at you, Celtics.

It's a tough week for Celtics fans.

Speaking of Boston, we get the Green Monster, we get the Green Monster Kid.

A little bit, but it's again, these ballparks are so interchangeably filmed in this movie that it's hard to get any sense for that.

It said Fenway Park on the screen, and I went, hey, we're at Fenway, And then they showed a green wall and I went, hey, the Green Monster.

But they also did that thing that I hate. I think you brought this up when we did the Late Lamented Banchick podcast. At one point they're playing in Fenway Park and the Red Sox manager. I think Babe Ruth hits a home run or something, and the Red Sox manager says, no one's ever done that at Fenway, Like his emphasis is to totally on the wrong. It should have been Fenway, the hard syllable on the first syllable. But he says Fenway, which tells me that I don't know.

It's they should have caught that. It just seemed silly.

It's like scull A Square's talking about that.

That's the big one. Yeah, Scully Square. If you look at the word Scully written out s c O l l A Y, Yes, Scully that's what it says. Right. No, not if you're from Boston and there's a Scully Square reference in the Perfect Storm, and he shouldn't even be mentioning Scully Square. Scully Square has been government center for fucking ever. But fucking George Glooney's out there talking about Scullay Square. I'm like, what, First of all, you wouldn't

But in fairness, the Boston area is filled with hard to pronounce cities and towns like Worcester. Wister is spelled Worcester, So if you're not from here, that's how you would pronounce it.

But it's Worcester woo.

S t e r.

It's pronounced like or even I'm from a place called Peabody, Peabody. But you know, when I would when I went to school in the Midwest for college, they would always say, oh, you're from Peabody. It became like a joke in my friend group. So anyway, they fell into that trap.

You know, there is mister Peabody and Sherman.

This is true, So that's even more of a reason why they should have understood that. It's well, actually they call him Peabody.

That's why that's what I'm saying. I called it pavity because I'm I grew up next to you.

That's right, that's true. But anyway that it's funny that that didn't catch your ear. Also, but like the fact that he said Fenway, it's like and it's it's almost like you have to think harder to pronounce it that way. It's an intentional thing because you should naturally just say Fenway.

I don't know. It bugs me follow alone.

Final regional reference light dawns on marblehead.

Mar that's it. That's your Massachusetts minute. Thank you, everybody.

Jumping. Joe Dugan didn't get on to the Red Sox until after if that had already left.

Yeah, I read that too.

A lot of this is surprising because, as we've talked about John Fusco and Young Guns and Young Guns too in particular, he is very much a stickler for historical detail. I think we've spoken his praises with that, the fact that, I mean he takes some liberties when necessary. But that was a little surprising too, that these little details didn't quite add up.

Now I've now said that I think this movie should have begun already well into his career. He should have already been married to Claire, who's played by Kelly McGillis. In this movie, he has this on again, off again romance with this woman who is Ty Cobbs manager or accountant or something at some point when he first meets her and they end up getting married. And that's the actual good part of the movie is during that scene.

Kelly McGillis is really good in this by the way.

I think the fact that I don't know if she just stopped acting out of choice or or maybe the roles weren't coming to her for whatever reason. But she was really good in her quote unquote, heyday, she's really good in this. I thought she was very genuine if.

The most recent thing I saw her in was Ty West's film The Innkeeper, and she was great.

Right on.

I have I have not in it.

I've had that forever. I've not had the chance to watch it, but I will check it out.

Now.

Did you realize that we had a bit of a six degrees of Fusco in this movie?

No?

Can I walk you through this a little bit? Take a look?

Oh?

Please do so.

At towards the end when Babe Ruth is playing for the Boston Braves and he's on the down swing, they're playing Pittsburgh and the picture for Pittsburgh.

It's like this thing. They have a bit of a.

Duel and the pitch is really trash talking babe, and of course this ends with the babe hitting a home run.

The picture for Pittsburgh. Did you recognize who it was?

Father Malone? No?

See, once they say the actor, You're going to know exactly where I'm going with this, But I'm gonna go ahead anyway. The actor's name is A guy named Richard Tyson who who you and.

I both three Lock Buddy Buddy Ravel.

From Three o'clock High, the antagonist one of our favorite movies, Three o'clock High.

Well, so follow that that could be our other school thing.

It should be, because that's a fantastic.

High school, then a bunch of college.

So think about this, okay. So in The Babe we have Richard Tyson from Three o'clock High. The Babe is written and produced by John Fusco. In Three o'clock High, we also have Casey Schimasco who is the protagonist. Casey Shamasco was of course in Young Guns, another John Fusco written movie.

So there we have it.

Six degrees of Fusco between Casey Shamasco and Richard Tyson.

I was delighted by this.

He fucks up Richard Tyson in that movie.

He does at the end.

Yeah, he lays him out. It's great.

Richard Tyson is so good in that movie.

Yes, I love that movie.

He's like every he's every Nerds nightmare, the bully that is just waiting to kick your ass at three and there's nothing you can do about it, no matter what you do or say or plead or beg or bribe nothing. He's implacable in that.

Richard Tyson has one scene basically in Blackhawk Down. I think he has maybe two lines in the entire movie, and him and those lines made me love that character and maybe really sad when he got killed.

So good I got to see what he's been up to. I don't.

I haven't seen too much with him for a while, and it'd be a shame because he's so good.

At a certain point, Babe Ruth's first wife, Helen dies in a house fire, and now he has to take care of his child, who is his child, which we would like to have known, but we didn't know. It's just this adopted girl. And first of all, the way they deal with that is they just have her sitting in the dugout with him and hear him like hugging her tight for a few shots. Right, that's the fallout from the mother dying, and now that we don't there's

Interesting? Was it a deal where maybe? Yeah, I don't know.

I can't say that that would have been an interesting thread to pull on a little bit, maybe would have added some because look, we've seen him do a lot of reprehensible things in this movie. We saw him hold his manager over, like the manager comes down on him and tells me he's gonna be cut or something, and he picks up the manager while he's on a moving train and threatens to drop him from the caboose.

Okay, so I guess here's the thing about that scene. That scene starts out really, really fucking good. It's the first time that John Goodman actually seems like a fucking cocksucker. Like when he gets mad and throws that tray over, that's not the part when he approaches trainy Alvarado, he slaps a glass out of her hand, and it's the first time that you felt the weight of this man's actions in the movie, and the movie came alive for a minute with his anger because John Goodman can get there.

And the fact that in all of our research there was never a factoid about the manager that Babe Ruth killed by throwing him off a train, So I knew instinctively that the guy was really in no danger of actually being killed by Babe Ruth. So that part of it, I don't know. You're right, it is played a little bit for not comedy, but you didn't. It didn't feel as electric, like you said, as the prior part of that scene where the threat of real physical violence is

I don't know. I don't want to impugne the man's character, but nor do.

I, but you know, there is that level of angerly. I mean, he was abandoned as a child, and he basically plays a children's sport for a living where he's given millions, not millions, but at the I guess for rated for inflation, he's basically getting millions of dollars and free equivalent.

I mean he's making one hundred and twenty five thousand dollars in nineteen twenty five or whatever. That's got to be a few million now. I mean, I haven't run the numbers, but sure he was making They they take pains to say that he's making more money than the president at that time, who was probably considered the guy.

So yeah, so obviously he was capable of anything. And I just thought that one scene we got a bit of what it probably felt like to be around the man.

Let me ask you about something else that I had a real problem with in this movie. At the spoiler alert, we're going to talk about the very end of the movie. So this movie traffics in the middle shot almost no that what I'm talking about now is when he goes to visit the little boy in the hospital, the call to he doesn't he tells me he's gonna hit. The cold shot is when he points to center field and says, I'm gonna hit. But in that case he says, I'm gonna hit a home run for you. No.

Two.

Now, a couple things before I even get to what I'm talking about is number one, that it didn't happen that way. I believe Babe Ruth sent him some autographed balls, like I think the team signed a ball and basically said to him, Yeah, he never met with the boy in person, is what I'm saying. I think that's another example of this movie sort of trafficking and an old timey sports biopick sort of tropes to have him I'll hit one for you, Sonny, oh too. So number one,

Could you just win one for the kipper?

So so that's but anyway, that's all preamble to what I'm getting at So the thing that caprit all of this, and the thing that kind of made me most frustrated, is at the very end of the movie, when the Babe is I finally had his last at bat with the Boston Braves. He's coughing up blood. This is all foreshadowing of his eventual demise at the hands of throat cancer. He's walking back, he's quit. He's handed in his hat or his cap to the manager.

And says, I'm done. I'm finished.

And he's walking through the tunnel and this guy comes out of nowhere and says, hey, babe, that I'm Johnny Silvester. I'm the kid that you visited in the hospital and blah blah blah, and here this.

Ball you gave me.

It's always given me magic and hey, I wanted to give it back to you because you're the greatest.

And then he walks away.

I don't know that just it was so unearned to me, and that seemed to be the worst offender as far as making this scene like Pride of the Yankees or the Babe Ruth story with William Bendix or something.

I just that to me was like, so I hated that ending. What did you think.

I thought, yeah, it's unearned. There's probably ways to have baked it in that would have made it acceptable. If we had met him that kid earlier in the movie as an adult, and then it's revealed I was that kid. Here's the ball. That maybe could have worked. But the way they've done it is he says, yeah, I'm the kid, here's the ball you gave me. I just wanted to thank you, and then he says I'm gone, Johnny, I'm gone,

That's what I'm talking about.

It felt like, I don't know, I got flashbacks to that old was it Doctor Pepper with me and Joe Green.

Exactly what I was thinking of. The fucking handing over the jersey to the kid who's gifted him as Doctor Pepper.

Dr Pepper.

I it just seemed, I don't know, there's other ways that get it was like the dios x Makina isn't the is like boy ex Machina like this.

He just came out of nowhere, this kid that we haven't.

Thought of for three quarters of the movie, and all of a sudden, hey, remember me, I was part of that special moment that, by the way, it never really happened. And here the o the greatest baby of the greatest, don't ever forget.

And that I don't know.

It just seemed an odd note to end the movie on. I didn't feel his I just didn't feel the heroism

Yeah, and it's too episonic in nature to have led up to that there. I didn't feel his last time at bet any more weight than I felt his first, or the third, or the seventh. It was we know he was gonna he was gonna hit it. Knew he's gonna knock the ball out of the park man. That's what he does.

Exactly. Do you think this is?

I mean, is this something that you would ever consider recommending to someone who likes baseball or are there things you can pull out of this that make you feel like it's a worthwhile watch.

I'm not going to recommend this movie. Unfortunately. There are going to be bumps on the Fusca road. But this is not an example of a biopic that I would offer to anyone. I would tell you to read about Babe Ruth. I think before I pointed you in this direction, because it doesn't really work dramatically as a just a movie where hey, we're going to take the basic facts of the guy's life and we're going to embellish it and fucking go for it, which is one way to

I really wanted to like this movie because obviously we're deep into Fusco Fest and we've had some really killer movies.

Loved Young Guns one and.

Two obviously, and Crossroads, of course. I think you're right.

I think there's sometimes we're going to have some bumps in the road along the way. And I wanted to like it.

But it just didn't add up. Like you said, it

Yeahanna, I'm glad we did them out of order because next up on Fusco Fest. Everybody to tune in. Next time, we're going to be talking about thunder Heart, probably the preview for it right here. That's right, We are going to be talking about thunder Heart on the next Fusco Fest. Until then, HP, where can people find you when they want to hear all of your delicious tones, your malicious musical moments.

My mushmouth, you can find me. I'm elsewhere on the Weirding Wad Network. I co host the Night Mister Walters Taxi podcast alongside my erstwhile co host Father Malone. Right here, I'm an occasional Oh, I'm an occasional guest on The Culture Cast with Chris Dashu. I also host the Noise Junkies music podcast. And to top everything off, I have a band camp site hpmusicplace dot bandcamp dot com.

Yeah, go check out his music over there that I alt, but it's fucking great. Speaking of culturecast, I programmed the month of May. Those should be coming out soon and in fact, the first one features mister HP right here and myself and Chris Dashu where we were discussing the films of John Millius over there, and for our debut we chose Magnum Force. The second in the Dirty Harry films that should be out soon. Go listen to that. As for me, keep it right here, everybody here on

Thank you so much. Well this year, I am here to plug a movie and it's one I'm very proud of the baby.

It's the life story at Babe Ruth.

But believe me, it's a far cry from those old fashioned baseballm It's an object examination of the babes very celebrated but very turbulent life. And like I said, I'm very proud, and I'd like to show you some clips.

I'm Babe, I'm the Babe.

I'm the Babe. Babe, Babe, babat on the Babe by the Babe, the.

Babe, Oh Baseball.

Live, Babe, thank you.

Like I said, this is a different view of the Babe warts and all. We look into events in Babes's life that historians had never really examined. See what I mean.

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