This time Bill Buckner fields the ball
While the movie Pennant Fever starring Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon opened to considerable fanfare in 2005 (helped in part by the movie’s subject, the Boston Red Sox, actually winning the World Series while the movie was being made) the quintessential Red Sox movie may in fact be Game 6, a cheaper independent film starring Michael Keaton and Robert Downey Jr.
Red Sox fans surely know what Game 6 refers to- the historic game between Boston and the New York Mets in 1986; a World Series game that ended in a car wreck of a baseball game with the ball going through the legs of Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner. In Game 6, Keaton portrays Nick Rogan, a New York playwright who’s losing his wife, daughter and mistress, his father’s dying, and the star of his new play can’t remember his lines. Plus, there’s the specter of a New York Times critic who Rogan feels will destroy his play (and career). The entire movie takes place on Saturday, October 25, 1986 and Rogan figures if the Red Sox can win their first World Series since 1918 that night against the Mets then maybe his luck will begin to change.
The movie follows Rogan through an eventful day drawing comparisons to director Michael Hoffman’s work of 20 years ago, After Hours, a quirky, at-times scary, look at a man trying to work his way home out of a dangerous New York city. The actor who portrayed the hapless protagonist in After Hours, Griffin Dunne, produced Game 6, and appears as Keaton’s friend who had his career (or let his career be) destroyed by theater critic Downey.
Overall Keaton’s angst-ridden character resonates more with Red Sox fans than the terminally cute Fallon and Barrymore from Fever Pitch. Rogan’s temporally pulled out of his gloom by a sunny cab driver and her grandson only to be pulled into manic depression by the Mets’ miracle comeback. But the classically cynical Boston sports fan wants to believe. Nick Rogan wills himself into seeing Buckner field Mookie Wilson’s ground ball and the game continuing. It’s only after arguing with Met fans that he accidently catches a replay of what really happened.
What I liked most about the movie was that there were no references to the so-called, ``Curse Of The Bambino,’’ the curse that prevented the Red Sox from winning the World Series because they traded Babe Ruth to the arch-rival Yankees. I could be wrong, but the origin of that concept came right after the Buckner game. Game 7, the next day, a Sunday, was rained out, and the New York Times’ lead sports columnist George Vecsey had to scramble for a column for the paper’s Big Monday section. Said column dealt with how maybe it was the Bambino himself who willed one heartbreak after another on his former team.
Then it was the annoying Boston Globe scribe Dan Shaughnessy who made a cottage injury out of the curse with first a book and then too numerous columns to count that gave the spirit of George Herman power over anything that occurred on the field . Shaughnessy didn’t disappoint friends and enemies when he got a new book out about `,’the end of the curse,’ in what seemed like only days after Keith Foulke threw out Edgar Renteria for the final out of the 2004 series.
But getting back to the movie – Keaton and Dunne (who played brothers in a funny movie called ``Johnny Dangerously’’ years ago) have good chemistry together and Ari Graynor, ``Veronica Mars,’’ is a standout as Keaton’s daughter. Bebe Neuwirth ``Cheers’’ and Catherine O’Hara ``SCTV’’ and a zillion movies, are only in one scene each as Nicky Rogan’s mistress and wife respectively. If you’ve ever wanted to see Lillith from Cheers bare assed this is the movie..
How Rogan comes to terms with the loss is perhaps the weakest part of the movie (and the historical fact that the Red Sox and Mets still had one more game to play has to be downplayed for the sake of the narrative) and a few other questions come to mind. Why didn’t Nick Rogan make plans to go to the game if he’s such a big Red Sox fan? And while there are a couple of references to Johnny Pesky holding the ball too long in the 1986 World Series how come there’s nary a mention of Bucky ``Bleeping’’ Dent. Don’t true Red Sox fans hate the Yankees as much as they love their own team. Especially those living in New York.
Game 6 opened to limited release in 2005 but is now available in most video stores.