ttrryosborn
I saw this movie many years ago with my father on television. He told me about his experience with Monty Stratton.My father wanted to be a big league pitcher. He tried his luck with the White Sox in the late l930's. He only got as far as spring training before being sent down to the minors leagues. He liked to say that in the minors he made as much money as a soda jerk, but girls at parties were a lot more impressed with someone who played baseball than with some who made root beer floats. As a rookie in spring training, My dad was too shy to walk with the veteran ball players to the field. He always walked a distance behind them. One day, Monty Stratton turned back to him and said that if he wanted to be a big league ball player he had to walk with them. My dad got to know Mr. Stratton very well that Spring. Years later, after WWII and marriage, my dad met Monty again at a ballgame. They talked and Mr. Stratton told him that Hollywood was going to make a movie about him. My dad said they couldn't have picked a better man to make a film about.
grantss
The true story of Monty Stratton, a Major League pitcher who lost a leg and went back to playing baseball. We see his rise, in the 1930s, to be a world-class pitcher for the Chicago White Sox. In 1938 he loses his leg after a hunting accident and we see his recovery and eventual return to baseball.Powerful, moving story, well told. Doesn't drift, or get overly sentimental.Mr Nice Guy, James Stewart, is perfectly cast in the lead role, and doesn't disappoint. Plays the role perfectly. The radiant, always- cheerful June Allyson is perfect as his wife. Good supporting cast.A lesser-known Jimmy Stewart gem.
kckidjoseph-1
James Stewart brings his patented gusto to this portrayal of real-life pitcher Monty Stratton, who lost his leg in a hunting accident, but refused to give up, wearing a prosthetic leg as he made a comeback (Stratton went on to play in the minors from 1946-53). Stewart's frequent leading lady June Allyson plays his wife, who really did help Stratton make it back. If the movie never quite scales the heights of "Pride of the Yankees," it's not for lack of trying. Old pros Stewart and Allyson lift what might have been corny and even maudlin or predictable to a high level and something we believe and care about. And they deserve extra points for playing characters who were still living (and watching). Not many can do that, and do it well. Schmaltzy but moving and perfect in its own way. (Full disclosure: I still can't get over players who would lay down a bunt with Stratton on the mound.)
mark.waltz
Director Sam Wood was the man behind "Pride of the Yankees" which told the story of Lou Gehrig. Seven years later, he took on another real-life hero who survived tragedy-Monty Stratton. A farmboy with great talent as a pitcher, Stratton's career took a sudden tragic turn which cost him a leg. Jimmy Stewart adds on another American hero to his career of fictional and real-life men in MGM's touching tale that manages to be inspiring rather than a pale imitation of its predecessor. In their first of three pairings, Stewart and June Allyson are a perfect coupling, while veteran actors Frank Morgan and Agnes Moorehead give excellent performances as the man who discovered Stratton and his hard working mother. Morgan adds humor without being silly, while Moorehead is initially grim, a world-weary character who shows sudden sweetness the moment Stewart marries Allyson and brings her a grandson.Some real-life ball players make cameos as themselves to offer authenticity. The film manages to be sweet without overdoing the sentimentality, and Allyson doesn't get too teary as she would in later films. She's very peppy in the scene where they play catch after Stewart's hunting accident. This is a feel-good All American story of survival, what Gary Cooper referred to in "The Pride of the Yankees" as a bad break which made him feel the luckiest man alive.
AD
