Pride of the Yankees

Pride of the Yankees Collector's Edition DVD

Gary Cooper plays Lou Gehrig the first baseman for the Yanks who suffered from a crippling and incurable disease. Even when Gehrig was a student at Columbia University the press had already pegged him as a top ballplayer. Soon the New York Yankees selected Gehrig for their lineup and he became an overnight sensation on the baseball diamond. But this dedicated player--who had never missed a game once he stepped onto a Major League Baseball field--suddenly fell ill with a mysterious disease. As his body began to fail him Gehrig had to say good-bye to the fans who idolized him and to the sport he loved so dearly. The film's final scene is a deeply moving portrait of human courage. Also not to be missed is Babe Ruth's cameo appearance as himself. Cooper's performance is outstanding measuring up to the drama that surrounded the real-life events. THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEEES remains one of the greatest biopics ever filmed in addition to being perhaps the best sports film of the 20th century.

The Pride of the Yankees [VHS]

You'll be proud to introduce your kids to this film about virtue, courage, and an indomitable spirit. Like Treasure Island and Tom Sawyer, Pride should be required viewing for every family. Gary Cooper plays Lou Gehrig, the "Iron Horse" New York Yankee first baseman who became a record-setting legend in baseball. Sure, Cooper's a little long in the tooth to play a collegian, and he tries to capture Gehrig's innocence with a kind of eye-batting dopiness. But the last moments of the film, before Gehrig's final, famous farewell, transform the picture. Gehrig happens across a young man whom he had encountered years before in a children's hospital, and with this sequence, Pride becomes something more than a movie about innate talent and athleticism, or a lost era of America, it crystallizes into a film about (gulp!) human will. An absolute must. --Keith Simanton