The Natural

An average baseball player comes out of seemingly nowhere to become a legendary player with almost divine talent.

• Director: Barry Levinson
• Genre:Drama / Sport
• Runtime:144 minutes

Cast

Robert Redford : Roy Hobbs
Glenn Close : Iris Gaines
Kim Basinger : Memo Paris
Wilford Brimley : Pop Fisher
Barbara Hershey : Harriet Bird

Roy Hobbs (Robert Redford) is a child, playing baseball with his father on the family farm. Mr. Hobbs dies suddenly while Roy is still young, collapsing under a tree. That tree is split in half by lightning, and young Roy carves a baseball bat from it, on which he burns the image of a lightning bolt and the label ‘Wonderboy’.

In 1923, a 19-year old Hobbs is granted a tryout by the Chicago Cubs as a pitcher. The train to Chicago makes a stop at a carnival and Roy is challenged to strike out “The Whammer” (clearly based on Babe Ruth) (Joe Don Baker), the top hitter in the major leagues. He does so in front of many people, including a sportswriter named Max Mercy (Robert Duvall), who draws a picture of the event to put in the paper the next day. Just before Hobbs gets on the train, a young boy shouts, “Hey Mister what’s your name?!” Roy Hobbs responds by telling the boy his name and throwing him a ball. Back on the train, the naive Hobbs is seduced by Harriet Byrd (Barbara Hershey), an alluring but sinister woman, who gravitates to him after judging that he, rather than The Whammer, is now the best baseball player in the world. Byrd lures young Hobbs to a hotel room, shoots him, and then jumps out the window to her death.

The story skips forward 16 years to 1939. A fictitious National League team called the New York Knights has signed the now 35-year-old Hobbs to a contract, to the ire of the team’s gruff manager and co-owner, Pop Fisher (Wilford Brimley). With the Knights mired in last-place, Pop is angry he has been sent a “middle-aged rookie” and refuses to even let him participate in team practice. After a showdown in which Roy refuses to submit to Pop’s judgement of him when angrily told he is to be sent back to the minors, Pop is impressed and relents. When finally allowed to practice with the team, Hobbs shows incredible hitting ability. During the next game, the team’s star player, Bump Bailey (Michael Madsen), angers Pop with his chronic laziness in the field and Roy is sent to pinch hit. Pop jokingly encourages Hobbs to knock the cover off the ball, which Hobbs actually does, providing the game-winning hit for the Knights in a rain-shortened game. After a now-motivated Bump dies running through the outfield fence in pursuit of a fly ball, Roy takes over as the team’s starting right fielder and plays phenomenally, becoming the league’s sensation and single-handedly turning the Knights’ fortunes around. Hobbs’ spectacular success prompts Max Mercy to try and unearth details about his mysterious background, but Mercy’s attempts to elicit information from Hobbs himself are unsuccessful. Mercy starts a rumor that Wonderboy is a loaded bat, but the allegation is disproven when the league weighs and measures the bat, which meets specifications. Read more

Watch full The Natural online streaming for free