42

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I’m sure you’re all familiar with the number 42: bust sizes, the 42 Amendment and the number of times your mom told you the same thing, but this 42 is about the days that America started to grow up.

Set in the 1946 through 1947 years in basically Brooklyn, New York, it tells about the great Jackie Robinson, and his lovely wife Rachel, and the man with a great vision who was miles ahead of his time: Branch Rickey.

Starring: Chadwick Boseman as Jackie, Harrison Ford as Branch Rickey and Nicole Beharie as Rachel.

Rachel and Jackie Robinson in later years

The number 42 of course is the number of Jackie Robinson’s uniform, and is today retired by all of Major League Baseball with the exception of one ball player who is still wearing it (Mariano Rivera until he retires after this season).

The movie, like the subject himself, takes us to the old Negro league and the dusty roads of the Deep South, to the Kansas City Monarchs and the Montreal Royals in the high minor leagues in Canada. But it takes you somewhere else also, to the sadness that once was America, the so called “Land of the free: and the home of the brave!” The prejudice the American whites towards their brothers and sisters the American blacks.

The reproduction of the many ballparks in Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, Forbes Field in Pittsburg, The Polo Grounds in Manhattan and Crosely Field in Cincinnati, all lend themselves to a well-produced movie.

Jackie and Branch Rickey

There are two very strong scenes that bring home the stupidity of racism, hammering home points of view about being black in the stupid days prior to Branch Rickey’s and Jackie Robinson’s crusade: the non-sense of racism, and how hurtful and unjust it is. One scene takes place in the runway to the Dodger dugout in a game against Philadelphia and their manager Ben Chapman. Being ignorant and from the deep-south, Chapman rides Jackie unmercifully and unrelentingly, while with the past coaxing and promise to Branch Rickey, Jackie holds his temper and tongue from public display. But Jackie takes a respite in the runway where he takes it out in a storm of fury and anguish, slamming his bat across the walls until it splinters, then collapsing in a heap and sobbing. It strikes you there, or at least it did me, that his crime is he is a black man. That is it! But there is a second scene where Jackie and Rachel are walking together after Jackie had been deliberately beamed in the head where she says if they knew Jackie, they would be ashamed.

Chadwick Boseman as Jackie

The movie is not about baseball. it is about belief, and fairness and how courage is what binds it all together. If you wish to call it a documentary, then it is a documentary of human emotion and spirit and the will of an individual to fight not with his fists, but with his mind and soul for all his people.

Harrison Ford as Branch Rickey

I grew up loving the Dodgers. I was always proud that my Dodgers of Brooklyn were the first team in baseball to knock over the barriers that held men down and from enjoying the great game of baseball. When they took on Robinson, they took on greatness, and made the game truly, America’s sport.

You don’t need to be a baseball fan to feel the pain, the anguish, and the unfair treatment of what was handed to the black man and woman of the day. Being Italian American, I can understand some of that, but certainly not as much as a black man does.

Today, because of his sacrifice, great names like Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Ernie Banks have contributed to the game of baseball, making it better and more interesting, men like Roy Campanella, and Don Newcomb, along with Roberto Clemente and Low Brock, making it more exciting. Without these great players, the record books would be void of many fascinating records, the sport as exciting as white slice bread. Thank you gentleman, you made the sport what it is today, in spite of the bums like Braun and A-Rod, Palmieri, Sosa and McGwire.

The acting was a home run in my scorecard, the scenery was right down the middle, and the message a perfect game, if you haven’t seen this wonderful movie,