Field of Dreams

If you review it, they will come.

Probably not in great numbers, but someone is still reading as I make my slow way through the National Film Registry. This was an addition from last year and it popped up on Netflix, so here we are. Field of Dreams. There's no crying in baseball, except for this movie.

This is a film I vaguely remember from childhood, which turned out badly, because my perception of events was so messed up that I spent the movie with a strong feeling of confusion. That's my own problem, but it made for a sense of uneasiness that the film didn't really warrant. Of course, I grew up in the 90's, and the cartoons of the period were lousy with jokes about mysterious voices and random men popping up in cornfields. This film didn't reach the level of cultural osmosis as some of the other films I've talked about, but just enough to stay at the fringes of my consciousness. And since it's a magical realism film...

Well, everyone remembers Kevin Costner bumming around in his cornfield in Iowa, when a mysterious Voice tells him to build something. My child brain remembers the identifying of the thing taking way longer than a few scenes, and the building of the baseball stadium taking longer still, but my child brain also liked the Land Before Time sequels, so make of that what you will. Dead ballplayers begin coming out of his corn, and he and his family just accept this as par for the course... until the Voice starts getting really pushy. Now, though the family matter-of-factly watches what they are aware looks to the town like a familial delusion, the wifey balks at the husband driving halfway across the country to bother a reclusive author because money trouble. I think that's the thing that has always bothered me about magical realism. The family affected always seems vaguely aware that there is something out of the ordinary happening, but never connect with it in a meaningful way. The wife voices vague doubts about whether the Voice is really trying to communicate something important, since her hubby spent their life savings and part of the mortgage turning half their farm into a ghost hang-out. I would be freaking out that famous dead ballplayers were hanging out in my backyard, but what do I know?

So Kevin Costner goes to find Black J.D. Salinger (since the real J.D. Salinger threatened a lawsuit), they talk a bit about how much better the 60's were than the 80's are, and then decide to go find another guy... which leads to a timeslip, which... time travel and life after death are explicitly confirmed, and no one is remotely excited. I really enjoy fantasy, but I'm a stickler for laws being in place. If you're telling me all of this is happening in Iowa, then why isn't anyone going "Oh wow, GHOSTS ARE REAL!?! And all they want to do is play baseball? Well... okay."

Which leads to another bit of weirdness in the film - James Earl Jones waxing nostalgic over just how great things were in the 1910's and 20's. A big long speech from a black guy over a field of exclusively white baseball greats of the 10's and 20's, about how great and simple and wonderful a time it was - even though the KKK had its first major resurgence in 1915, and an anti-lynching bill was introduced in 1920 but not passed until 1922. Some ballparks had segregated seating. Jackie Robinson wouldn't be allowed to play in the Majors until 1947. So, honestly, this speech about the beauty and goodness and simplicity of old-timey baseball that was going to make people congregate in Ghost Field and pay for the privilege (which leads to the memorable closing shot... and me thinking "How the hell are all those people going to fit on that one tiny bleacher?") just seems really weird coming from a character we've been told was a major Civil Rights figure.

I don't know. Instead of seeing the touching heart-reunion between an estranged father and son, I just see more Baby Boomer navel-gazing about how totally awesome they were. So awesome that the dead will walk the Earth in order to give one mediocre white guy a chance to reconcile with his father. The quote may be memorable, but I honestly can't see what's so game-changing about this film.