Posted: 02/17/2004

Forever Loyal: A Salute to the Cubs Fans and Their Field

(2004)

by Alexander Rojas

Holy cow.

My detoxification of the 2003 Cubs baseball season is nearly complete. All mentions of corked bats, Prior injuries and goat curses no longer make me go into convulsions. My motto for the 2004 season is simply: Bartman who?…Ugh. Nevermind, but a new season is only weeks away and the Cubbies are on track for another playoff season. Note to those “fans” in the first row seats at Wrigley: Please refrain from the temptation of foul balls. PLEASE!. Thank You. With the excitement of the looming baseball season comes a DVD with three episodes of the Chicago Cubs experience.

In Inside Chicago: Wrigley Field the ballpark known as the “friendly confines” is heralded as the greatest ballpark in baseball. With narration by Bob Costas, the episode gives an up and close intimate view of Wrigley’s clubhouse with a guide through storage and locker rooms. There are glimpses not too many people get to see of Wrigley Field. Down on the actual field, lawn workers display their routine and methods that makes Wrigley the most beautiful ball park in baseball and up on the man operated scoreboard we get to see the lone operator manually changing scores and innings. Inside Chicago: Wrigley Field delves into several of the significant and hardest working people behind the scenes for the Chicago Cubs.

The Cub Fan is the second episode on the DVD and it’s a nostalgic chronicle of the most die-hard and loyal Cubs fans. From the Bleacher Bums to Ronnie Woo Woo to the Bleacher Preacher and many others, all appear and share their memories and philosophy behind their loyalty and passion for the Chicago Cubs.

The most entertaining of the episodes is the 9 minute piece called Fandemonium: 2003 in Wrigleyville. It mostly involves interviews with die-hard Cub fans before and during the sixth game of the NLCS outside of Wrigley Field. Perhaps this video was intended to capture the Cubs clinching their opportunity into the World Series. Unfortunately it wasn’t so and they were left with several overtly confident and blindly hopeful Cub fans declaring victory long before the first pitch. This portion brought back a lot of what I thought I had forgotten. Oh hell. Cubs in ‘04!

These episodes are a mostly brief run through of Wrigley Field and the Chicago Cub fans, but a certain fun teaser for the upcoming baseball season.

Alexander Rojas is the George Steinbrenner of Film Monthly. He takes all the good movies to review at any cost and he won’t be happy until he is awarded reviewer of the year.

Got a problem? E-mail us at filmmonthly@gmail.com