I have googled ad nauseum, and I still can’t figure this one out. Hopefully it will ring a bell for someone?
I remember seeing a snippet of a movie on tv, probably during the late 70s-early 80s. My memory of it is that a mom is upset with her son (maybe he has cancer? or he’s gay? ), something she thinks she can “scrub away”, she then pours pitcher after pitcher of scalding water over him in a tub.
I started to watch this, horrified, and then my mom made me leave the room. I had nightmares about it for years.
I know its not much to go on, but I’d love to finally have this gnawing image laid to rest. Can anyone help me with this?
Probably not what you’re looking for but there was a scene on The Shield in which Vic and Corinne get into an argument and forget about their toddler in the tub, who is scalded as a result.
I took the liberty of posting your question on the IMDb board, and one of the experts posited that the movie might be Judgment Day: The John List Story, which features a scene of his mother trying to “purify” young John List in a bathtub.
I, too, seem to remember something along those lines.
Young Man is a runner/track&field athlete who is dying of cancer.
At times, the pain is so excruciating that he has Mother pour boiling hot water on him in the bath so he can draw attention away from the tumor consuming his guts.
If it jogs anybody’s memory, a large portion of this story’s plot involves Young Man starting a track&field group of local kids…including a obese girl who always comes in last in the race.
At the end of the story, end-stage cancer is putting the kybosh on his mentoring role, so he starts giving away his many track&field trophies to members of his group…And his finest, most prized award (Giant trophy? gold medal?) he gives to the obese girl…for persistence.
It sounds vaguely familiar to me too, although I don’t see anything in John Ritter’s filmography that seems to fit. The best match for the movie described by Enola Straight that I could turn up was John Baker’s Last Race (1976). The IMDb description doesn’t mention anything about a bath scene like that described by Lightlystarched, but it does sound like the sort of thing that would be shown on TV (inspirational true story) and the time period is right.
Although thinking of John Ritter, something that’s stuck in my head for years is that there was an episode of a TV show I saw as a kid that I think was Hooperman (late '80s cop show starring John Ritter) in which a man was very sick and cold and was being given a hot bath to warm him up. All I remember was that the man (not sure it was the Ritter character) was yelling something like “It’s cold! I’m so cold!” and someone was pouring hot water on him in the tub.
I remember the medal referred to Enola Straight’s description, I seem to recall it being an Olympic gold medal (but it’s been a LONG time since I saw it, so that may not be correct)
"A down and out former minor league ballplayer finds romance and a renewed zest for life when he takes a job coaching a group of underprivileged kids. "