Pastime
by Robin B. Armstrong
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DVD details
Actor: Glenn Plummer, Jeffrey Tambor, Noble Willingham, Scott Plank, William RussDirector: Robin B. Armstrong
Brand: Buena Vista Home Video
Producer: Robin B. Armstrong
Producer: Eric Tyan Young
Writer: Jr. D.M. Eyre
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround
Format: NTSC
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 95 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2012-01-06
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: LIONSGATE
DVD Reviews of Pastime
DVD Review: Forgettable look at minor leagues in the 50's
Summary: 3 Stars
As a baseball fan, I really looked forward to seeing this movie. I've followed minor league baseball teams since the 60's. Modesto California Reds, Kenosha Wisconsin Twins, Salt Lake City Utah Trappers, Gulls, Buzz and whatever they are called this year, Ogden Raptors, and dozens of others around the country. This movie advertises cameos from baseball greats like Killebrew and Feller. Unfortunately the cameos are meaningless.
But the plot of the movie is full of potential. An ageing pitcher, played well by William Russ, struggles to hang on to the great love of his life, baseball, for just a little longer. He even is trying to set the record for longest career, shades of Kevin Costner in Bull Durham trying to set the minor league home-run record. He pitched once in the major leagues to Stan Musial who hit a grand slam off of him. And that's the high point of the film. The rest is even more of a downer than that.
****Spoiler Alert***** He fails at the record, staying in baseball, and life in general. But that isn't the point of this movie. Indeed, the movie has no point. Just when you think it will say something about ageing gracefully, it switches to another plot. Then you think it will say something about racism as the major character makes friends with a new black pitcher shunned by the others. But this relationship doesn't really develop either. They hang out together a little bit, but that's about it. Then you think maybe the movie is really about how the new player is helped out and guided by the veteran, but other than a few inanities like "look people in the eyes when you talk to them", this plot line also fizzles.
William Russ carries this film to its uncertain end. He is superb in this role. But the script is so weak that there isn't much that can be done. There are so many directions this film could have gone, but it ended up being a pastiche of unfulfilled sub-plots.
The veteran pitcher is cut from the team eventually at a team party, goes back to the ball park, and dies on the mound from pitching too hard. Yea, I know, doesn't make sense to me either although apparently the veteran takes blood pressure pills.
Anyway, this film is very disappointing and seems incomplete. You may find William Russ's acting as the veteran is the only noteworthy part of this film. I'd say this movie strikes out after watching a few curve balls go by. I'm not sure what the other reviewers saw in this movie, but I sure won't watch it twice.
Description of Pastime
In 1957, baseball is at its peak as America's national pastime. For aging minor leaguer Roy Dean Bream (William Russ - American History X, Disorganized Crime), whose dreams of pitching in the Majors died long ago, the love of the game is all that keeps him showing up game after game, season after season. But when the team signs on rookie Tyrone Debray (Glenn Plummer - Strange Days, Up Close And Personal), a 17-year-old black youth from the wrong side of town, Bream sees someone with the potential to achieve what he never could! As an unlikely friendship develops across the boundaries of race and age, these two ballplayers will inspire each other to become more than they ever thought they could be! Also starring Deirdre O'Connell (Dragonfly, Hearts In Atlantis), Pastime is a heartwarming crowd-pleaser you're sure to enjoy!This product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.
You don't have to be a baseball lover to appreciate this funny, touching story of minor-league ball and major-league dreams. Pastime is the most realistic depiction of the nonglamour side of sports as played by the people who seem to love it the most. William Russ stars as an aging pitcher, now in his 40s, who only got to pitch once in the majors. Still hanging on in the minors in the late 1950s, he can't believe his career could be over. Ridiculed for his enthusiasm by his much-younger teammates, he befriends the team's outcast, a young black pitcher (Glenn Plummer) with a cannon for an arm, and imparts what wisdom he has to offer. A movie that will make you ask: Why isn't Russ a star? --Marshall Fine
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