Boxoffice-June.1989

Reviews
days when baseball was the obsession that held them together
— and now he has that chance. As night falls, father and son
meet on a ball field and simply play catch.
"Field of Dreams" is just the first true successor to "It's a
Wonderful Life," that's all "Field of Dreams" is. Taking an
ordinary man on a mystical journey that ultimately resolves
the dissatisfaction and regret which hounds him, this luminous
fable tells a life-affirming tale which is so moving as to
almost reach religious proportions. By doing good — by using
his magical gifts to reunite a disparate group of men with the
game that was their life — Ray is finally given the chance to
put things right with his dead father. What could be more,
enchanting than that?
And yet we fear for this film. As evidenced above, to
describe the plot of "Field of Dreams" is nearly impossible.
And what comes through sounds perfectly ridiculous: Disembodied
voices? Baseball diamonds in cornfields? Ball players
ic'turning from the, dead? (And we haven't even mentioned a
FIELD OF DREAMS
Staning Kevin Cnstncr, Amy Madigan, James Earl Jones and
Ray LiottO-
Produced by Lawrence Gordon and Charles Gordon. Written
and directed by Phil Alden Robinson
A Universal Pictures release Fantasy, rated PG Riaming time:
106 min Screening date: 3/28/89.
The only way that this one-in-a-million fantasy is going
to survive is if it's allowed to stay in theatres long
enough for people to find it. Will exhibitors be willing
to go the distance?
One of the greatest films of 1989 presents one of the most
difficult marketing challenges of all time. "Field of Dreams,"
an impossibly beautiful fantasy about lost goals and the
cleansing purity of baseball, is one of the most unorthodox, yet
spiritually satisfying films to come out of Hollywood in
decades, but its unique tone could go right over the heads of
the general public. And if that happens, it will be a tragedy.
"If you build it, he will come," a disembodied voice tells Ray
Kinsella (Kevin Costner) as he walks the cornfields of his Iowa
farm. Ray, a very common man who still retains some of the
idealism from his activist days of the 60's, dwells on this voice,
and he finally figures out what he is being commanded to do:
If Ray will build a baseball diamond in his cornfield. Shoeless
Joe Jackson, one of the disgraced ball players from the Black
Sox scandal of 1919, will return from the Great Beyond to play
the game which he loved and which he was accused of betraying
decades earlier.
So Ray builds the baseball park, and Shoeless Joe (Ray Liotta)
emerges from the surrounding cornfield to bat the ball
around. Simple as that. Don't question it; don't let your rational
mind talk you out of believing it. This is a fantasy; all rules
are suspended.
The voice returns two more times, each time guiding Ray to
a man who loved baseball with a passion, but who was denied
the opportunity to play. One is Terence Mann (James Earl
Jones), an embittered writer from the 60's who very reluctantly
joins Ray's seemingly insane quest. The other is Moonlight
Graham (Burt Lancaster), now an aged country doctor, who
only got to play one inning in professional baseball before
washing out. Ray brings them both back to his cornfield,
where, in his absence, other famous ballplayers from eras past
have gathered.
Through the rejuvenating magic of the cornfield, Mann and
Graham ultimately attain their goals, but Ray still doesn't
understand his part in all this. His neighbors think he's crazy,
his farm has slipped into financial despair, and all he has to
show for it is a private box seat at some of the greatest baseball
games ever played.
But one day, as the players depart and disappear into the
cornfield, one player remains; it is Ray's father, now a young
man. Ray and his dad, himself a committed baseball fan, had
parted on bitter terms years earlier, and his father had died
before Ray could set things straight. All Ray has ever wanted
to was to repair their torn relationship — to return to those
brief but essential flirtation with time travel ) We have the
theory that audiences have simply become too sophisticated
and/or too cynical to accept a story this fanciful, and we are
afraid that most people will spend all their time concentrating
on the illogic of the premise without being able to suspend
their disbelief and be transported by the message (keep in
mind that "It's a Wonderful Life" wasn't accepted by
audiences when it was first released either).
"Big" was based on a pretty outlandish concept, but once
the gimmick was established, the fantasy element of the
movie was shoved into the background. "Field of Dreams" is
built upon an ethereal premise which is essential from start to
finish, and which must be accepted fully for an audience to
have the magic worked upon them. We're not sure that
enough people will get "Field of Dreams," but nothing would
make us happier than to be proved wrong.
The film is rate PG for very mild language.— Tom Matthews
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