Bullet Points: Night Game
Action movies with sports popular in the U.S.A. are a common sub-genre but they don’t happen as much as other action films because the filmmakers are potentially limiting the audience. It is hard to pass up that sweet, sweet international box office money to make a movie with a sport millions don’t understand. That doesn’t mean you should sleep on any of these movies, and one such action thriller that has a baseball milieu is the 1989 movie Night Game. Baseball is a large part of Night Game, but an understanding of baseball is not so let’s step up to the plate and take a look.
- Eighth Wonder of the World – Night Game opens with a night game (that makes sense) with the Houston Astros playing in the Astrodome. You don’t need to like or understand baseball to enjoy the opening B-roll in the famous domed stadium. We soon meet Dt. Mike Seaver… and I don’t care if Mike Seaver is played by Roy Scheider in Night Game, you can’t tell me there is a character from something in the 80s named Mike Seaver and not have me think of Kirk Cameron in Growing Pains. This Mike is a huge Astro fan and was a former minor league ball player but now is a detective in Galveston after some flub up in Dallas that is not really important.
- Winning is Life or Death – Sayings in sports are often filled with hyperbole, but not when blonde women keep dying every time Astro pitcher Sil Baretto wins a home night game (there it is again!) It seems like a pretty specific set of circumstances and it is and that is probably why the police can’t figure it out until the end of the movie. The search is where lots of the fun comes in Night Game. The not fun part is the old man Mike Seaver and young woman Roxy (Karen Young) relationship that doesn’t do much for Night Game except to give us some conflict between Mike and Roxy’s mother, who is Mike’s age. It is also good to point out that Roxy is a blonde. Dun Dun Duuuun!
- Captain Hook – The police are baffled about the unique throat slashes on the murder victims. They think it from a hook that a longshoreman would use. Clearly they didn’t look at the poster for Night Game, it is obviously a prosthetic hook. Dummies! No wonder the governor wants to send Lamar Whitty down to help out, and yes the police laugh at Lamar Whitty’s name. You won’t be laughing when you realize Whitty is played by one of the great smarmy actors in Lane Smith but is criminally underutilized. Night Game actually gives more time to another great onscreen a-hole with Paul Gleason playing a county sheriff with a weird corruption subplot.
- Autograph – The killer leaves notes with his victims and has pretty nice handwriting. Mike assumes that it must be a celebrity because they are always signing their names. That is a pretty big assumption but its frickin’ Mike Seaver. If he would have looked at the poster, Mike would have got the baseball connection much sooner. You’re gonna need a bigger boat!
- Strike Three – Night Game takes its time for the police to find out the who and why of the murders, and I don’t blame them because the poster doesn’t have a face. It also doesn’t have Rex Linn’s name. That’s right, Rex Linn shows up with about 5 minutes to go looking like a crazy man. I would look crazy too if I took a page out of The Rock’s playbook and cut off an appendage for a film role. Of course, the hook arm hangs about a foot lower than the abled arm so maybe his real hand is still under the hook.
Night Game is an enjoyable little thriller that has baseball as a backdrop but could be made without the sport. I am glad the Houston Astros and the Astrodome got a chance to shine, especially the post wedding scene during a game. I am also glad the police didn’t look at the Night Game movie poster because that would be cheating. There is no reason for the movie or the Houston Astros to be associated with any sort of cheating. That would be unthinkable. Ending these Night Game Bullet Points with some Night Game Bonus Bullet Points would be unthinkable.
- Marquee Reunion – Mike drops Roxy off at a movie theater playing Full Moon in Blue Water starring Gene Hackman. I like to think it was for The French Connection starring Hackman and Scheider, but probably because Night Game and Full Moon in Blue Water were both directed by Peter Masterson.
- Racist Quote – Paul Gleason’s Broussard shouts out this troubling quote: “How would you like to kiss my black cat’s ass.”
- Astrodome – If you are like me and enjoying seeing the Astrodome in movies, you can also check out Brewster McCloud, The Bad News Bears in Breaking Training, Murder at the World Series, or Friday Night Lights.
- Best Color Man in the Business – Character actor Marco Perella plays the color man for the Astro radio broadcast and is a small treat, he also was a booster in Friday Night Lights. Has he beein in a non-Astrodome movie?
