Cinematic truth and Robert Redford
Robert Redford, the actor whose golden smile and understated persona warmed movie screens for decades, attended the University of Colorado on a baseball scholarship.
When he died on Tuesday at 89, Redford was remembered, among other things, for his one baseball movie: “The Natural.”
Released in 1984 when Redford, at 47, was well past baseball retirement, “The Natural” tells the story of Roy Hobbs, an ex-player who makes a sudden and miraculous return to the game, leading his team to a championship which he caps off with a prodigious homerun that crashes the light standards.
With blood dripping from an old gunshot wound administered by a psycho lover rendered for the screen by the great Barbara Hershey, Hobbs smacks his four-bagger off a young, fire-balling left-hander for the Pirates.
In uniform for the (fictional) New York Knights, Hobbs triumphs over a venal boss, a conniving gambler, a suspicious newspaper man, and a femme-fatale (played by Kim Basinger). In the process, he reunites with the woman who bore his son and has never forsaken him (portrayed by the haloed Glenn Close).
Above all, Hobbs encounters his youthful self while embracing his one true calling as a baseball legend.
Set in the 1930s, the movie’s costuming is evocative (fedoras and vested suits) with a cityscape reminiscent of Depression-era America (Close’s character lives in Chicago). Even with its dark spots, “The Natural” kid of tugs at the heart with a happy heading
“The Natural” is fantastical – fantastically enchanting.
Following Redford’s death, The Athletic’s Tyler Kepner reported he spoke with retired big leaguer Raul Ibanez about the movie.
Ibanez summarized his favorite baseball flick this way: “It was about a guy who loved baseball, and it got taken from him. It was [about] this deep appreciation for the opportunity” to play again.
The movie turned the ending of Bernard Malamud’s novel of the same name on its head.
There was no playing around with the true-life facts of Redford’s 1976 film, “All The President’s Men.” Co-starring Dustin Hoffman as The Washington Post’s Carl Bernstein, “All The President’s Men” is the story of the Watergate investigation conducted by reporters Bernstein and Bob Woodward (played by Redford).
Watergate refers to the apartment complex in Washington, D.C., in which the Democratic National Committee kept its headquarters. Nixon administration operatives attempted to burglarize the office of DNC chief Larry O’Brien. Their capture began the slow-motion (or so it seemed) unraveling of Richard Nixon’s presidency.
In August 1974, Nixon quit the White House rather than face certain removal from office by Congress.
The movie followed two years after Nixon’s resignation. In the meantime, Woodward’s and Bernstein’s narrative treatment of their reportage appeared in their book “All The President’s Men,” which Redford had a hand in.
According to Woodward, Redford urged the reporters to put their experiences down on paper. The film rights were subsequently purchased by Redford.
The movie has the look and feel of actual reporters and editors sweating to get the story right. The stakes were high. One scene has Post editor Ben Bradlee (played by Jason Robards) ferociously fretting that the only thing at stake for Woodward and Bernstein, the paper and the country was America’s democratic future.
Friends for half a century, Woodward commented last week on Redford, calling him “a genuine, noble and principled force for good who fought successfully to find and communicate the truth.”
Woodward related how the original script for the movie tweaked the facts in one small instance. The screenplay by William Goldman had Woodward saying about a story he and Bernstein were composing, even though they knew the reporting was incomplete: “Let’s write it anyway.”
Reviewing the script, the real Woodward jotted down, “Wrong” next to the dialogue. “The whole concept is, stick to … what’s factual. And Redford agreed with that completely,” Woodward said.
The script was changed. The movie continued with Bernstein/Hoffman and Woodward/Redford doing more probing.
Great actor, that Robert Redford. Excellent truth teller.
Richard Robbins lives in Uniontown. He can be reached at dick.l.robbins@gmail.com.