DaytonDailyNews.com

We cannot make what's here — salary disputes, steroids and an All-Star Game of dubious quality — go away completely.

We can, though, go back to old-time baseball, at least in video.

That's what Major League Baseball and HBO have done with the "Brooklyn Dodgers: The Ghosts of Flatbush" documentary, set to debut Wednesday (8 to 10 p.m.).

It chronicles the Dodgers between 1947-57, from Jackie Robinson's signing to the team signing off to Los Angeles: 50 years since moving, 60 years since Robinson.

It emphasizes the melting-pot quality of Brooklyn and the reality of changes in the neighborhoods while shifting blame on the Dodgers' departure from owner Walter O'Malley to New York building commissioner Robert Moses. It was Moses who created roadblocks for O'Malley's plan to build a new park in the borough.

The Dodgers were different then. Those who hated the Yankees for winning so much in a lot of ways were booing the city of New York as well.

Brooklyn had no such problem, even though it was situated just across one of the world's most famous bridges from the big city.

Brooklyn, HBO points out, had an inferiority complex that allowed itself to call its team the bums and have a sad clown mascot. On the lips of every Dodgers fan were the words, "Wait till next year."

Next year came once during that 11-year span, in 1955, when the Dodgers did, finally, win the World Series. They won the National League pennant six times and were denied a seventh by Bobby Thomson's dramatic 1951 playoff home run for the hated Giants.

All of it is painstakingly recreated in this film, from Robinson's arrival to the demolition of Ebbets Field. If you're not careful, it could bring a tear to your eye, as might the glimpse of old Crosley Field in Cincinnati.

It's really a lovely film, showing a softer side of New York and baseball players who were part of the community, playing in uniforms baggy enough for comfort and trim enough to have style.

Imagine a player of today saying something like former pitcher Carl Erskine said of playing for those Dodgers:

"My best days in baseball had been at Ebbets Field. I can almost smell it ... The kids on Knothole day. The celebrations after a win. When you try to describe it to somebody, they get this mysterious look on their face, like, 'I don't know if I understand.' They can't, if you hadn't been there."

If you can't enjoy this film, you can't enjoy baseball.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2157

or mkatz@DaytonDailyNews.com.