Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested) Binding: VHS Tape EAN: 0024543025733 Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC Label: 20th Century Fox Manufacturer: 20th Century Fox Number Of Items: 1 Publisher: 20th Century Fox Release Date: November 16, 2001 Running Time: 90 minutes Sales Rank: 6221 Studio: 20th Century Fox Theatrical Release Date: 2000
Description: As baseball's first Jewish star, Hammerin' Hank Greenberg's career contains all the makings of a true American sucess story. An extraordinary ball player notorious for his hours of daily practice, Greenberg's career was an inspiration to all and captured the headlines and the admiration of sportswriters and fans alike. This is the story of how he became an American hero.
Amazon.com: Aviva Kempner's Peabody Award-winning documentary is about baseball like Field of Dreams is about cornfields. Kempner efficiently covers all the bases of Detroit Tigers Hall of Famer Hank Greenberg's magnificent career with archival footage and talking heads, including family members, former teammates and baseball legends, broadcasters and sportswriters, and such unabashed fans as Alan Dershowitz and Walter Matthau. If this biography's style is not remarkable, its subject certainly was. Greenberg, the son of immigrant parents, was a beacon of hope to Jews. As one observer notes, baseball was a way of "showing we were as American as everybody else." To see one of their own succeed in the national pastime at a time of virulent anti-Semitism was a source of pride and inspiration. One lifelong fan, a rabbi, states, "He was the baseball Moses." Winner of several critics association awards for Best Documentary, this is a stirring film for all seasons. --Donald Liebenson
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: - A Bigger-Than-Life Hero To Millions Of People
I've seen this promoted many times as a movie for Jewish people because it is about their first big baseball idol, Hank Greenberg. A lot of the material here deals with how big an idol Hank was to all the Jews in Amercia back then. I found that interesting, but I watched it simply because I love baseball, especially the "old days" and am thrilled to see footage of any Major League baseball games and stars from the first half of the 20th century. If there is a human-interest behind the diamond heroics, all the better!
Greenberg was a likable guy and I enjoyed seeing him talk here and ... Read More
Rating: - Hank Belongs Up There with them all.
I grew up as a Yankee Fan and still am a die heart Yankee fan now and all my life. Being Italian the great Joe D was my hero. And the more I read about Hank Greenberg, and after watching this movie, I have to say, that Hank Greenberg belongs right up there with the Joe D, Babe Ruth, and the Iron Man #4.
I could watch this movie over and over. Thank You Hank.
Rating: - Greenberg, #5, 1st baseman, Detroit Tigers
The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg may be the best baseball documentary ever. Not as thorough, long or epic as ken Burns' Baseball from 1994, L&T of H.G. is a wonderful vision of a player who's legacy is fast fading from the era still associated with DiMaggio, Gehrig and Ruth. His ascension to baseball immortality is partly due to his being the first great Jewish ball player. Besides Sandy Koufax, Greenberg can easily be considered the greatest Jewish player ever. He was the winner of two MVP's and two Championships with the Tigers in 1935 and 1945. Greenberg lead the Tigers to their first series ... Read More
Rating: - A solid homage to a trailblazing ballplayer
This film doesn't back even a quarter inch from being a documentary of a great Jewish ballplayer. The opening theme song is "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" in Yiddish. It sets the tone for the whole film in perfect fashion.
One of my professors in grad school explained to me how he changed his name as a grad student in the 1930s in order to "pass" as what we would now call WASP in order to escape the "Jew quotas" placed against the hiring of too many Jewish professors. Today we forget just how anti-Semitic much of the United States was before World War II and beyond. As this documentary ... Read More
Rating: - An exceptional documentary
I think this is a truly exceptional documentary on many different levels. First, it tells the story of one of the best baseball players in history, who often goes unrecognized for his skills. I consider myself a big baseball fan, especially in the history of baseball and stars of the past. Yet before this movie, I knew very little about Hank Greenberg. Despite being one of the best hitters at that time, Greenberg isn't talked about very often. This DVD gets his story out, and shows how dominant of a ball player he was.
A major reason that Greenberg is often overlooked when people talk ... Read More
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