The Catcher Was A Spy is about Morris "Moe" Berg, the player with the not-quite-illustrious 15 year career who went on to play an historic role in World War II against Nazi Germany. I'd have put the trailer here, but it's one of those where they hack the dialogue so much that it doesn't match the action and completely misleads about the movie.
A pretty high powered cast portrays the story of the enigmatic Berg transitioning from his playing days into the OSS using his Stanford studies in languages to find the head of the Nazi version of the Manhattan Project to see if they are close to developing The Bomb. Unfortunately, the movie works so hard to show how unusual Berg was that we don't really get enough of any one facet - or in some cases too much. Brief glimpses of his playing days with Ruth, Gehrig, Cronin, and the like are glossed over in favor of scenes where you're never sure if his private relationships are for real or not - and therefore they lose impact or distort the story. For what you get in an hour and a half, a full two hours may have been an improvement. You get the idea that he is fluent in several languages, but not much else of his expertise. He's probably a little rougher in real life, but Paul Rudd is so All-American boy that the edginess is lost.
When I heard about the story, I looked up his cards (of course). There aren't many, but there are a few that mention his "other interests".
This '33 Goudey (image from the internet) is his first.
I like this Play Ball from 1940. Though looking up actual sales sites, any of these appear to be three crooked numbers in price, so I don't know that I'll be picking one up at the next show.
He was a fascinating character, though he wasn't going to win any awards on the diamond. And neither is the movie about his exploits. Which is too bad. Apparently, the book is much better.
Read the book a couple of years ago. He was an interesting character, how much "spying" he really did is up for debate. He seems like a difficult person to cover in a movie.
ReplyDeleteRead the book and saw the movie. N.O.'s comment on how much spying he did is a fair one for sure. Even still, he's one of the more interesting characters in baseball's history and I've added two of his cards to my collection. One is a reprint of the Goudey show in your post and the other is from Tri Star Obak.
ReplyDeleteI saw the movie, and it was kind of a disappointment for me. I think it tried to cover a little bit of everything in his life and I would have preferred a narrower focus. He was definitely an interesting guy though.
ReplyDeleteIt would be cool to stumble across a dvd of this movie at my local flea market one day. It would be even cooler to stumble across that Goudey rookie card.
ReplyDeleteI have done some reading on him from various web sites. I think I would enjoy the book.
ReplyDeleteIt's so weird I stumbled across this post tonight. My wife and I were just talking about this movie the other night and I couldn't remember the name of it. That Goudey card would be cool to own. Thanks for sharing!
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