Blog Directory CineVerse: "Bingo" scores with baseball lovers and movie fans alike

"Bingo" scores with baseball lovers and movie fans alike

Thursday, May 30, 2013

Yesterday, CineVerse caught all 9 innings of "The Bingo Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings," a quirky African American baseball comedy from the mid 1970s. Here's a play-by-play recap of our group discussion:

WHAT SURPRISED YOU ABOUT THIS FILM?
·       It takes a very lighthearted, comedic approach to a dark chapter in American sports history: the segregation of white and black baseball players, and doesn’t tackle a lot of the racial undercurrents of that era
·       Good casting: Memorable performances by Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones and the scene-stealing Richard Pryor
·       It’s a crossover movie that appeals to all races, not just African Americans, although it overwhelmingly features African American characters
·       It’s a baseball-themed picture, but it’s arguably less a film about the sport and spectacle of baseball than it is about black entrepreneurship and independence
·       As one critic put it, it was “part of two concurrent waves of 1970s cinema: movies about African Americans going into business for themselves (like Car Wash), and movies about the wild side of the first half of 20th century America (like The Sting, The Godfather)

CONSIDERING THAT RACISM AND RACIAL SEGREGATION IS AN IMPORTANT COMPONENT OF THE STORY OF THE NEGRO LEAGUES AND NEGRO BARNSTORMING TEAMS, DO YOU FEEL THAT THE ISSUE OF SYSTEMIC AND INSTRINSIC RACISM IS EXPLORED ENOUGH IN THIS FILM? OR IS THAT TOO DEEP AND DARK A SUBJECT MATTER FOR AN OTHERWISE LIGHTHEARTED FILM?
·       Tonally, this movie is a nostalgic comedy featuring an all-star black cast, so it’s best elements really only need to be laughs and familiar stars
·       Hence, the approach is cheery, light and comical; to delve too deeply into racial subtexts would create a dark, deep drama, and that wasn’t the apparent intent here
·       Nevertheless, considering that so few movies to that time even tackled the topic of the Negro Leagues, and that so little historical footage of negro league players even exists, perhaps the filmmakers had an obligation to address the issue of racial segregation and the difficulties these players faced in white-dominated America

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE THEMES WOVEN INTO BINGO LONG THAT YOU CAN IDENTIFY?
·       The pluck, spirit and determination of the underdog: facing off as an independent against the established order
·       American entrepreneurship: the can-do resolve of a self-made man, no matter the color of his skin
·       Black pride and black power, as not only demonstrated by the characters, but by the African American actors and filmmakers, who included producer Berry Gordy

FILMS THAT REMIND YOU OF “BINGO LONG”
·       The Jackie Robinson Story (1950)
·       42
·       Don’t Look Back: The Story of Leroy ‘Satchel’ Paige (1981 tv movie)
·       The Harlem Globetrotters (1951 movie)

OTHER FILMS BY DIRECTOR JOHN BADHAM
·       Saturday Night Fever
·       Whose Life Is it Anyway?
·       WarGames
·       Stakeout

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