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Community Corner

Filmmaker Marino Amoruso Presents "Baseball Chronicles"

Sachem Public Library hosts the New York native who has new baseball film out.

From the time he was a kid, Marino Amoruso wanted to be a second baseman. The only other things that came close were his love of writing and the movies.

Sick with the mumps for a week as a child, Amoruso recuperated while tuning into the Channel Nine network's "Million Dollar Movie," catching several viewings of "She Wore A Yellow Ribbon." The artful but undeniably American look of Ford's films, paired with the restrained brilliance of its actors' performances, made an immediate impression.

He would return the favor some years later, when he penned, produced and directed the primetime television presentation "John Ford's America" in 1989, a respectful nod to the legendary director's influence featuring interviews with actors who'd worked for him, including Jimmy Stewart, Harry Carey Jr., and Ben Johnson.

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As a compulsive writer - he'd written a children's book at the age of six -, Amaruso's dreams of being on the field may have not materialized, but his strengths as a storyteller have allowed the Flatbush native to live vicariously - in the best way possible - through his numerous interviews with many of the sport's legends.

In 1990, while working for FoxSportsNet's ancestor Sportschannel, he wrote and directed "The Halls of Fame," one of his first features for the network. Divided into 10 parts, it included interviews from Brooklyn Dodgers catcher Roy Campanella, Dodgers pitcher Don Drysdale and recently-deceased Minnesota Twins power hitter Harmon Killebrew.

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Some of the footage he accrued, intended but not wholly used for other projects, was repurposed for what he called a sort of "greatest hits" of baseball memories, named "The Baseball Chronicles."

"A lot of the guys I've interviewed have passed away," he said before the movie. "But some of the most interesting parts of those interviews weren't used. I've interviewed a lot of people, but I thought it was more interesting interviewing Johnny Blanchard than President Nixon."

"I don't know if that's unpatriotic," he added with a laugh.

Shown at Sachem Public Library's Community Room last month, the movie is structured around a series of nine vignettes, subtitled as "innings," discussing everything from Jackie Robinson's breaking of the color barrier in 1947, to the Dodgers win of the 1955 World Series, to a seventh-inning stretch featuring a mini-blooper reel of Yogi Berra doing a spot for sports memorabilia dealer Steiner Sports.

The teams represented and the breezy banter of the interviews - the backstories are revealing and reverential, without the suffocating somberness of many similar works - definitely skew toward New York, but the unfiltered history from the mouths of the greats themselves makes Amoruso's work enjoyable regardless of team loyalties. Slated to be presented as a series, many more hours of interviews remain in the pipeline for future volumes.

Bob DiMarsico, of Holbrook, said he was impressed with Amoruso's movie, adding that he couldn't wait to see more of his work.

"My dad was one of the only Giants fans in the Bronx," he said. "I still think Willie Mays is the man."

For Amoruso, of course, balancing his unabashed love of baseball with the expected protocol of his job can have some drawbacks.

"There's always that kid inside you when you sit down with the ball players," he said to the crowd afterward. "The only downside is I never ask for autographs, out of fear that is seems unprofessional. But I sometimes wish I had."

But for a true fan, it's not a bad drawback to have.

"Maybe next time I see Yogi," he added with a grin.

Amoruso's most recent project, entitled "Jackie Robinson: My Story," grabbed the Gold Award at the 2010 Long Island International Film Expo for Best Film. More information is available at his website.

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