Director Aviva Kempner imbibes her work with authority, admiration, charm, and passion. She previously directed a feature length documentary Partisans at Vilna about Jews fighting against Nazis in the Polish and Lithuanian underground. Kempner also consulted on a documentary about Israeli political icon, Shimon Peres. In Life and Times of Hank Greenberg, Kempner not only inspires by capturing Greenberg’s unfaltering drive and dedication, but shows the far reaching influence he has had on American Jews. Because of Greenberg, many of today’s prominent men and women in entertainment, politics, law, and sports were encouraged to imagine their potential for greatness in the face of prejudice and isolation during the American depression era.

Senators, Congressional Representatives, TV celebrities, sports figures, and teammates gather to remember the great man. Alan Dershowitz, for example, who is usually a curmudgeonly critic of popular culture and defender of Constitutionally sound but publicly suspect cases like OJ Simpson’s, waxes with childlike simplicity and enthusiasm about the importance of a secular, Jewish hero making it to greatness at the top of a sports game. Greenberg himself comments from the interview segments made in the 80’s. And of course, the film features black and white newsreels and sports footage of Greenberg’s game and bat accompanied by great old swing tunes.

Greenberg was hardly the stereotypical Jewish man. He was tall (6’ 4"), Hollywood good looking, and gifted with superb eye-hand coordination. Though he once took off from an important game to observe Yom Kippur thus emphasizing his Jewishness and making nationwide headlines, most of his life, Greenberg shunned religion as a divisive force. Far from being a verbal scrapper, he diffused the prejudice he often faced with patience and overwhelming competence.

As an athlete, Hank is enshrined in Cooperstown at the Baseball hall of fame. He came within two blasts of matching Babe Ruth’s homerun record, and almost defeated Lou Gherig’s record for most runs batted in. To serve in WW II, Greenberg interrupted his baseball career for four years. Through his struggle to return to the game, Hank exhibited what is perhaps his most sterling and inspiring quality: amazing dedication to hard work and practice.

As the film winds up, it discusses the unfortunate circumstances under which Hank was traded from the Detroit Tigers of the American League, where he played his entire professional career, to the Pittsburgh Pirates of the National League. The owners of the Tigers appear to have acted with prejudice and mean spirited callousness, but we are not presented with a version of their side of the story. While the implications against the owners may be well founded, we will suspend judgment in the spirit of Dershowitz-like insistence on fair presentation.

As much as this documentary makes serious points about culture and prejudice, its charm comes from the quiet authority of a man dedicated to his game. Greenberg played not only against the trend of the dominant culture, but also in contravention of the norms of his Jewish upbringing. A good Jewish son was expected to become a doctor or a lawyer, not a sports player, and there lies the even greater importance of someone like Greenberg. He proved to Jewish children, and especially boys and teens, that they could rise to the top in any endeavor. Hank Greenberg lit the imaginations of those constrained by external trends and internal doubts to aspire to a different possibility than what was commonly available.

Website

Because this is a documentary that will not likely draw the kinds of audience numbers to warrant a wide release, it may not have a long showing in theaters. We invite you to consult the official website, which lists expected show dates in selected cities nationwide. Please, log in to http://www.hankgreenbergfilm.org/ to catch this fine documentary.)