Curse of the Bambino (2003)

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By 1920, the Boston Red Sox had won five or the 15 World Series. Its star player that year was a young triple-threat man and home-run impresario named George Herman "Babe" Ruth. One would naturally assume that the Sox would want to hold on to this valuable property at all cost -- and one would be… More By 1920, the Boston Red Sox had won five or the 15 World Series. Its star player that year was a young triple-threat man and home-run impresario named George Herman "Babe" Ruth. One would naturally assume that the Sox would want to hold on to this valuable property at all cost -- and one would be wrong. Faced with enormous debts after backing a failed Broadway musical, team owner Harry Frazee was in desperate need of quick money. His solution: to trade the Babe to the New York Yankees. Ever since that dreaded day, the Red Sox have endured nothing but headaches, heartbreaks, and not one single solitary Series win. Can it be that a curse has been leveled upon the team thanks to Frazee's improvidence -- The Curse of the Bambino? In this amusing, but heartfelt, HBO documentary narrated by actor Ben Affleck, archival footage and contemporary interviews are woven together to illustrate the plight of the benighted modern-day Sox fan -- and the Herculean efforts made to "break" the curse, among them an ongoing effort to recover a battered piano that, according to legend, Babe Ruthdumped into a Boston pond back in the 1920s. The interviewees, rabid Sox addicts all, range from a Beantown rabbi to actor/comedian Denis Leary. When The Curse of the Bambino originally aired September 2003, some reviewers, moved by their own devotion to the underdog Red Sox, were unable to assess the film's merits without bursting into tears. And who could blame them? ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi