The Natural

The Wonder of Wonderboy.

The Natural is directed by Barry Levinson and adapted to screenplay by Roger Towne & Phil Dusenberry from the novel written by Bernard Malamud. It stars Robert Redford, Robert Duvall, Glenn Close, Kim Basinger, Wilford Brimley, Barbara Hershey, Robert Prosky and Richard Farnsworth. Music is by Randy Newman and cinematography by Caleb Deschanel.

The Natural is a wistful sports movie, one that asks every person who views it to buy into the whimsy and mythologising on show. If able to do that then it's a film of beguiling beauty, awash with strength of the human spirit and of luscious technical credits. The Arthurian core to Roy Hobbs' (Redford a superb presence yet calmness personified) second chance ensures we ...

Many, many years ago when I was a bit of a sports fan, I remember reading stories about scouts who had seen athletes in the olden days like Roy Hobbs. Players who could hit a ball a mile or throw a hundred mile per hour fastball, but who never made it to the big league for some reason. But of course, this movie is based on a novel by Bernard Malamud, though there are hints of actual events here and there.

It is an entertaining movie, presenting baseball as Americas game and therefore, ultimately, above corruption. It has an old timey feel, perhaps even older than the 1939 setting that is presented. The movie is less gloomy than the book, and I guess the purists dont like that, but for me, life is gloomy enough and the mood and ending wer...