This happened to be on television when nothing better was. There's not an awful lot of actual baseball in this, so if that's what you're looking for, you'll want to continue your exhaustive search. In general, I'm not entirely certain whom this is for. The few attempts at comedy are never funny(then again, they don't appear to be the focus). This is about a kid who forms his own team, and begins to wonder if the janitor Mack Henry is really Buck McHenry, the fictional pro player. It is nice that it is not revealed until the very end if it is him or not, apart from the fact that if it is(I won't give it away; also, do not look at the cast credits here on the site until you've watched it, or decided that you couldn't care less), his new name must not have taken more than a second or two to come up with. Just about every acting performance in this is terrible. The commenting on racism is good, if it can be heavy-handed(also, is it absolutely necessary to defend the whites? I guess they're taking a lesson from Mandela, but still...). Pacing is fine, the 90 minutes could seem longer than they do. I haven't watched anything else by this director; however, I understand that he's usually considerably better than this. I recommend this to people who find the concept interesting, I guess. 5/10

Agree that the plot is a bit thin, however, the information contained within this movie is excellent. Recently, my 8-yr-old son and I watched portions of Ken Burns' baseball mini-series. While watching "Finding Buck McHenry", he was able to remember the names of the old Negro League players, such as Satchel Page, Josh Gibson, and "Double Duty" Ratcliffe. Too bad more movies aren't made about the Negro League. Perhaps Hollywood will find some way to tell the stories of these great ballplayers. My son feels that the movie needed more baseball scenes (had just one long segment with actual play), but that the information dealing with the Negro League was very nice. Not to brag, but he remembered that Pee Wee Reese was one of the Brooklyn Dodgers to welcome Jackie Robinson to the team!

`Finding Buck McHenry' is a strange film. It has all of the trappings of a low-budget ABC `Afternoon Special.' Its performances are wildly uneven. Ossie Davis gives a memorable performance as Mac Henry, the school custodian whom young Jason Ross (played by Michael Schiffman) is convinced is the fictional former Negro League baseball legend Buck McHenry. But Schiffman and the most of the rest of the cast give poor performances. Ruby Dee, Davis' real life wife, plays his movie mate, and has little to do. All of this is a bit surprising since Charles Burnett, who helmed the critically acclaimed `To Sleep with Anger," directed the filmBut the movie does an excellent job of conveying the racism faced by the Negro League players, and doesn't reveal until the end whether Henry is McHenry.Three problems with the plot: McHenry supposedly had three great seasons in the Negro League before disappearing after a brush with the law, and yet was named to its hall of fame. Hall of famers in almost any sport must have a much longer track record than that. Secondly, if Henry is McHenry, he supposedly had been in hiding for 50 years after his brush with the law, even though the movie acknowledges that his `crime' would have long ago been forgotten. Finally, the film wants us to believe that a baseball fanatic like Jason would never have heard of the Negro League, which I find unlikely.

This was a nice movie. I love baseball movies, and have enjoyed Ossie Davis' work since Joe Vs. The Volcano. The basic plot is a bit thin, but it gives a nice history lesson on the Negro Baseball leagues, and a nice touch that a young white boy would find interest in them. This is a good movie for young baseball fans.