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Boyhood dreams, a bat
made from a tree struck by lightning and most importantly, a never-ending
passion for the game.
 Darth
Buzz
SCORE: 7
One of the best sports movies ever on certain levels. The
Natural taps into the mythos of baseball better than any other baseball
film and maybe better than any other sports movie does for it's sport.
There are problems with the film though, mostly with pacing. The last 30
minutes of the film slow down and affects the flow of the film. (although
that may be because of sideline distractions that I will discuss later.)
Most of the characters in The Natural are cool too. Roy Hobbs... need I
say more? Who in the world of baseball doesn't know the name, Roy Hobbs?
Pop Fisher played by Wilford Brimley (the god of Drunken Master) is great
too. He looks and acts like most of the real life Major League Baseball
managers that you've seen. Red Blow played by Richard Farnsworth also
plays his role well, very believable. Finally, who doesn't like to gaze
and mentally drool at Kim Basinger? Woot!
The movie as a whole has strong parts that so overwhelm any pacing or
other issues that it is quite easy for me to recommend it. If you
like baseball and you haven't seen this film, what the hell is wrong with
you? If you don't like baseball this is the type of film that might
just get you interested.
Now, back to the sideline distractions that I mentioned earlier. I was
watching The Natural on DVD for this review, with two other staff members
of Movie Pit, Jurassic Mark and Drunken Master and we were all consuming
spirits. <shock> We had been drinking earlier, watching Friday Night
Fights on ESPN and then started the movie, so by the time we were watching
The Natural some of the members of Movie Pit were quite sloshed. I of course
was not that sloshed, for which Drunken Master always finds it necessary
to shake his head in scorn at me and call me a pussy. I fear pain so I
refrain from mass consumption of alcohol so that I don't have a vomit
session with pounding headache for half the next day. I'd like to think
that I'm at least a little smarter than a dog that eats it's own vomit. Anywho, let us just
say that the other two members of the staff are professionals in the arena
of inebriation, and their conversation had turned to the ridiculous.
Somehow the topic of discussion had turned to how long and thick JM's
toenails are, and then Drunken Master started to demonstrate how JM could
attack his opponents in a pointy toed fashion with his extra thick and
long toenails. I believe this is just part of JM's Jurassic like nature,
another of which is his spitting habits. I'm quite sure that he could kill
anyone by distracting them with his weird spitting style and then cut
their throats with the technique demonstrated by Drunken Master. This is
why I am somewhat unsure of the pacing of the last part of the film.
Drunken
Master
SCORE: 3  Beers
Now I played a little high school baseball, and now I got a messed up shoulder, but the real meaning of this moment is the utter adoration of baseball. It's
gimmicks, it's heroics, it's everything. From the beginning of this movie we see an aged minor leaguer waiting for a train to the bigs, we see his story, live his story, then finally dream his story. If there is any true
American out there who doesn't love baseball, and this movie doesn't inspire them to awe the sport in some way after viewing.....Get Out. If you aren't
particularly drawn to the sport before this movie and aren't after......Get Out. As a matter of fact, if you don't dig sports in general in any shape or form.....Get Out. Your homeland is waiting for you....It's death squad is waiting at the airport for you're extremely important return to the promised land.........nuff sed. |
