The Natural starring Robert Redford
Director: Barry Levinson


Essential Actor / Actresses Here

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From the sun-dappled heartland, a young man (Robert Redford, in soft lighting) emerges as maybe the best baseball player anybody's ever seen. On his way to the majors, he is cut down by an enigmatic black widow (Barbara Hershey) and vanishes for many years. When he reemerges, a silent mystery, he lands a spot with the New York team and begins tearing up the league--he's still the natural. Fans of the Bernard Malamud novel will be dismayed at the pure mythical hokum of this film, but baseball fanatics have been known to watch and rewatch this one; after all, it's constructed as a kind of shrine to the national pastime. Barry Levinson (Rain Man) directs the movie with an unabashed devotion to the game, although the film could use more of the realities of chewing tobacco and pine tar. Redford is fine, and Kim Basinger and Oscar-nominated Glenn Close are effective as the women in his life. The crowning touch is the soaring, extraordinary music by Randy Newman, the singer-songwriter turned orchestral composer.

This allegorical tale of success and failure in America tells the story of a natural born baseball player who should have been a star. Set in the 20 and 30s, the film opens with ace pitcher Roy Hobbs heading to Chicago to try out for the Cubs. The scout travelling with him makes a bet with a sports writer at a carnival that Hobbs can strike out a famous ball player. Hobbs succeeds in accomplishing this, and seals his future--or so it seems. However, he spends his first night in Chicago with a charming but strange flapper he met on the train. Inexplicably, she shoots him in the stomach. Fifteen years later, Hobbs is languishing as the oldest rookie for a last place, major league team. But he gets another chance to prove himself when the team's star player dies. Hobbs comes through, and leads his team into the World Series. Hobbs, however, takes a bribe to throw the series. Then, during the deciding game, circumstances arise that test him once again...

 

 

 

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