Two Cents is a Cinapse original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team curates the series and contribute their “two cents” using a maximum of 200-400 words. Guest contributors and comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future picks. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion. Would you like to be a guest contributor or programmer for an upcoming Two Cents entry? Simply watch along with us and/or send your pitches or 200-400 word reviews to cinapse.twocents@gmail.com.
The Pick: The Natural (1984)
The Team
As a pretty big fan of sports cinema, The Natural was one of those films that always sat on my watchlist, something that I knew I’d enjoy, but never made its way up out of the dugout onto home plate. Luckily, I finally filled this blind spot, and was honestly a bit surprised at what I found; specifically, that this feels like the blueprint to the modern sports film, especially baseball movies.
Let me know if this sounds familiar; a down-on-his-luck former star, on the back half of his career, joins a near failing team. After showing those young jocks how a real man plays the game, the team’s fortunes are turned around, and they now find themselves heading towards a championship. Good thing, too, since a scheming partner plans on taking over the franchise if they don’t win the big game, putting the coach and the star player out of a job. Now, what movie was I talking about? Major League? Baseketball? F1? Any Given Sunday? Nope! The Natural!
Sure, one could see this as a bit of a negative, especially if you’ve seen enough sports films to see the story beats a mile out, but I instead found it a fun ride, taking a familiar route with an insane cast. It is an incredibly stacked cast, from the headliners Robert Redford, Glenn Close and Robert Duvall, all the way down the cast list, filled with character actor after character actor, all of them recognizable.
It’s also a film that is a bit at war with its source material. The Natural, the 1952 book that this is based on, takes a completely different tone. In the novel, the story of Roy Hobbs (Robert Redford) is that of corruption, temptation and the downfall of man. Hobbs in the book is kind of a bastard, an egomaniac whose untethered view of himself leads him into ruin as he allows unsavory forces around him to manipulate and corrode. The ending of the novel is bleak, as the once promising Hobbs destroys his life through sheer self-centerness.
The Natural, the film, is very much not that. Instead, all the bleaker and satirical elements are taken out, making for a more palatable story of triumph through perseverance. I still enjoy what it is, but it is also funny the elements here that the screenplay couldn’t really sand down completely, like the Memo relationship or the “Bump” Bailey death, which, the crash into the newsreel, might be one of my favorite hard cuts, just for the sheer escalation of it all.
The Natural is a fun, if not cookie cutter, sports film. Yeah, it may take itself a bit too seriously at times, and the idea of a bleak satire version of this story sounds amazing, but, for what it is, it’s a nice little inspirational tale of never quitting.
I’m not much of a sports guy. Don’t play them, don’t watch them.
Naturally, then, I’m not much of a sports MOVIE guy. Right? Well, I guess that can’t be entirely true, as the Rocky series is one of my favorite franchises in cinema history. Regardless, it’s not surprising that I had never gotten around to seeing The Natural, and I’m thrilled to have closed out our Cinapse curation of Robert Redford titles with this beloved baseball classic from director Barry Levinson.
And as a devotee of Rocky, I have to say that The Natural kind of shook me. Full spoilers ahoy.
Did you know that Redford’s Roy Hobbs is straight up shot in the stomach in the first several minutes of this movie?! I simply was not expecting this, and it left my jaw on the floor. Redford is so youthful to my mind in this movie in comparison to other recent watches of The Old Man And the Gun and Spy Game, that it didn’t occur to me that this would be an underdog movie about a gifted player who is past his prime and taking one last shot to live his dream. That gut shot sidelines Hobbs’ dreams, and after a huge time jump we experience him as a mystery, much like all the other characters in the film do. Who is this dinosaur who is totally unknown as he was brought down low before he ever made a public debut? Why is this man so preternaturally gifted at the game? Can Hobbs wrestle his own demons and be the late-stage hero his team needs?
I loved how the script played out, showing us the youthful, raw, wide-eyed talent of Hobbs, then cutting him to the core, then reintroducing us and keeping us in the dark as to how his life has played out and brought him to this final precipice of redemption or obscurity. This allows Hobbs to be quietly wise, to be mysterious, and to be someone we can relate to even if we aren’t primal, naturally gifted athletes. We’ve all had dreams that didn’t quite work out; we’ve all experienced disappointment and loss. The Natural allows us to cheer unabashedly for Hobbs and his charming teammates (the cast of characters is truly epic), while also seeing a bit of ourselves in the disappointments and dreams deferred. As we cheer Hobbs to a last chance victory, we believe, if even just for a moment, that we, too, still have a chance at greatness.
January Lineup: A Keaton Curation
