Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

MusicChat It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

FeverDog My endless search for baseball movies led me to a beat-up VHS copy of NIGHT GAME purchased off Amazon for 1¢. A serial killer flick with a baseball connection? This I had to see.The plot, or at least the motive of the killer, was intriguingly unique: a reliever cut from the team exacts revenge by using his hook (which replaced his throwing hand lost in a bus accident that occurred when he was going back to Triple-A) to slash blonde women who resemble his replacement's new wife, striking when the new star pitcher posts a win. Cool, right? Like the movie BLINK, this killer's motive is unlikely but plausible; it could have made a decent movie (like BLINK).But NIGHT GAME --um, don't want to go there...but..okay -- strikes out with poor directing, most notably in the complete lack of suspense during the stalk sequences. This is one of those movies where the female victims do nothing to defend themselves, actually putting themselves in unnecessary danger. The worst offender is the last victim. Question for the ladies: If you were being followed by a creepy truck in the middle of the night, would you run into a construction site, up the stairs, with your shoes off? Suppose you would; after stepping on a nail, would you cower on the edge of the floor begging for mercy, or pick up a 2x4 and defend yourself? One other attack doesn't make much sense either. Two young ladies are murdered inside a carnival's house of mirrors. Now, wouldn't you think somebody would notice a guy with a hook for a hand enter/exit the attraction? With a serial killer on the loose who already killed an employee of the carnival, security would be stepped up just a bit, don'tcha think? One expects these lapses in a Jason flick, not a supposedly serious movie starring the man who killed Jaws. These scenes (actually, every scene in the movie) are directed with the minimum amount of energy required, and so forty minutes into the movie you're wondering how much longer 'til the end.There's not enough bloodshed here to satisfy the gore crowd, only one gratuitous boob shot to please those looking for gratuitous boob shots, and not enough actual baseball intertwined with the plot to make those like me recommend it on those grounds. In fact, the only things I got out of this movie are some shots of the Astrodome and some movie-geek trivia: here's a movie with actors from Jaws 1-2 (Scheider) and 4 (Karen Young I think her name is, possessor of aforementioned boob). Too bad Dennis Quaid or Lea Thompson didn't make an appearance.

sol1218 ****SPOILERS**** Towards the end of the movie "Night Game" Houston Astro pitcher Sil Daretto, Alex Garcia, walks off the pitchers mound as the game is about to start and to the surprise and astonishment of all those on the baseball field and in the stands walks over to newlyweds Mike & Roxy Sever, Roy Scheider & Karen Young. Daretto congratulates them on their wedding and sincerely tells Mike & Roxy to enjoy the game, the nightmare was at last over for all of them.A number of young women were found dead in and around the beaches of Houston and Galveston and the one thing they all had in common is that they were murdered when Houston Astro ace pitcher Sil Daretto pitched and won a night game at the Astro-Dome. They also they had their throats slashed by some hook that the killer used. The movie "Night Game" mixes baseball with murder in this very unusual story about a disgruntled former Houston Astro player Floyd Epps, Rex Linn, who was cut by the team to make room for Daretto and on top of all that lost his pitching hand in a bus accident as he was leaving. Epps wants to upstage Daretto when ever he wins a ballgame by committing a murder that same night and getting the headline for his crime over Daretto victory. It's Epps' insane way of getting even for what he holds Daretto responsible for; the loss of his job being a pitcher for the Astros and his left hand. Roy Scheider sleep-walks through his role as a former baseball player now Galveston policemen and the movie is better then the average made for TV movie even though it isn't but should have been one. The ending was a bit ridicules with Epps chasing Roxy all over the catwalk outside a waterfront restaurant with Roxy not having the sense to get inside and thus not getting trapped by the insane hooked killer. In fact Roxy actually ran outside the eatery as she saw Epps and easily got trapped by him. Mike came to Roxy's rescue in just the nick of time with Rex hook and all getting dumped in the ocean below after taking a number slugs from Mike's revolver.Dopey but watchable film that was a bit too unbelievable not in the fact that Epps was a crazed former baseball player who felt that he got a raw deal from life and wanted to rectify it in his own crazy way. As you would have expected the local police as well as the Texas justice department were so slow and incompetent in realizing who Epps was when the evidence was right in front of them, the man the hook and the motive, but were just too blind to see it.

Pittwater The main drawcard is the exciting actor, Roy Scheider. Sadly, he can't carry such a deadweight on his own. The script was absolutely awful and the directing dreadful. The story was slow and the fight scene at the end was like a children's recital. That's not the fault of the actors as I blame that on the director. I like to know who finances these type of films. Too much money and not knowing what to do with it must be the diagnosis. On one interesting note is Karen Young. Does she remind you of Shirley MacLaine or what?

Michael O'Keefe Roy Scheider plays a Galveston, Texas police detective trying to catch a serial killer. It seems when a popular Houston Astro pitches a winning night game, a beautiful blonde winds up dead near the beach. This crime drama also stars Richard Bradford, Paul Gleason, Karen Young, Lane Smith and Rex Linn. This movie quickly becomes predictable, but keeps your interest to the end.