The Morning Blend
Welcome
Complete Media Kit
Commentary by Matt Hickman
Herald/Review
Harold Ramis said his 1980 comedy classic Caddyshack was originally supposed to be a sort of communist manifesto that wound up being hijacked by the hijinx of Bill Murray, Chevy Chase and Rodney Dangerfield.
The irreverant and terribly uninteresting caddies were ill-equipped to carry the social commentary and their presence only detracts from what is otherwise the most quotable film in history.
There is however one meaningful scene that involves the poor caddies themselves.
|
|
Judge Elihu Smails, played brilliantly by the late Ted Knight, threatens his employees by telling them they could be replaced by golf carts at the drop of a hat, thereby implying it’s his compassion for the working man, and not economic imperatives, keeps him from firing them all.
Right away you notice that the caddies are snotnosed punks who couldn’t care less about their meager jobs at the Bushwood Country Club or that they were living in the last days of their craft. Ergo, Judge Smails isn’t talking to them — he’s talking to you, common worker.
In this way, Caddyshack is less a working man’s picture than it is the standard sci-fi story of: Man’s labor is replaced by machine. Man foolishly gives machine that replaced him more power. Eventually, man becomes a slave of the machine.
As in the Terminator series, handing over control of daily life to the machines seemed like a good idea at first. So it was with the advent of the golf cart. Once perceived as a game for fat cats, golf began opening up to everybody. Caddies were thought of as reincarnations of oppressed cabin boys, finally emancipated by technology. Caddies could now be players, illustrated by the Huck & Finn type of relationship between Chase’s Ty Webb and “be the ball” Danny.
Out went the plaid pants and obnoxious sweaters that made the game a masquerade for the rich, and in came a much more modern, practical, younger look.
And when a person of color became the world’s top player, it seemed the door had been kicked in and golf was now everybody’s game.
So it would have been if Caddyshack was a movie about class warfare. But it wasn’t. It was a prequel, if you will, to The Rise of the Machines.
•
Courses in the densely populated northeast are beginning to mandate golf cart use, but expect to see this crackdown on walking spread to the sparse west.
The human leaders say they are doing this under the auspices of speeding up play.
“I think they’re doing it under the auspices of increased income,” said Pete Campbell, general manager of the Turquoise Valley Golf Course in Naco. “All things considered, if you’ve got good players walking, if they have their heads in the game, they can play just as fast as a group of carts. They don’t get involved with herding tendencies.”
Granted, if good golfers ride carts they will play very fast. But most golfers are bad golfers and good golfers should be walking like they’ll have to on the PGA Tour. I’ve had many an aft view of these “herding tendencies.”
Most carting foursomes attack a fairway thusly: Everybody hits and three of of them wind up somewhere in the rough. One cart drives to the first player’s ball and chunks it about 40 yards, then drives across the fairway to the other player’s ball and he does the same. This bumper-to-bumper, rush hour, fairway crossing, sometimes backtracking, continues until everyone gets on the green. Then, each golfer marks and cleans his ball and squats to get a perfect view of the line for his triple-bogey putt.
By this time, it’s the law and the law alone that keeps me from hitting into them.
If they were walking, each player would walk straightaway to his ball and they would all hit about 20 seconds apart, getting them to the green much faster than their carting counterparts.
Even if they are a little slow, you can at least respect their determination to get a little exercise and do their part to keep golf a sport.
This isn’t partly about squeezing the customer; it’s all about squeezing the customer. If golf courses aren’t making enough money, then why don’t they just raise greens fees? Why all the stone soup deception?
“(Raising greens fees) is a hard thing for them to do. By mandating carts, they can boost revenue,” said Dan Wickman, head pro at the San Pedro Golf Course in Benson.“Not a lot of golf courses are making money these days. The average retired couple is getting squeezed a lot of different ways with gas prices and such. People have less money for golf than they did five or 10 years ago.”
•
Will man ever fight back against the machines, and will we see the return of the caddy?
“Most of the people who play golf are over 55 years old. I don’t think a lot of them are going to want to walk,” Wickman said. “And I don’t think the kids want to do that.”
Campbell is sympathetic to the idea.
“The USGA has a (caddy program). They’re trying to bring back the art of caddying to golf — it’s a beautiful thing,” he said. “It surely stimulates the relationship between one generation and another and it adds to the social aspect of the game.”
Still, he’s not holding his breath.
“I don’t see us getting that anytime soon, but it would be great to have caddies back in the game,” Campbell said. “Some would say it detracts, other would say it adds an element and maybe you could get a little more out of your greens fees if you had a viable caddy program.”
•
I’m not opposed to golf carts in the same way I’m not opposed to wheelchairs, hearing aids or eyeglasses.
If you need them, they are a godsend. But to use them if you don’t is more than a little shameless.
If you can handle a five-mile walk, do it. If you don’t want to carry or pull your clubs, well, that’s what grandchildren are for.
To walk a round of golf is to hurl a Molotov cocktail at the machines that will one day rule us with an iron fist.
BA wrote on Aug 30, 2007 11:15 AM: