1984 Review Blog
The Natural
Grade: B 09/09/2009
It is amazing to me that with such a lifelong love for baseball, I have never seen THE NATURAL. I recognize the theme, I knew the name "Wonderboy"...I just never got around to seeing it. This is truly a love letter to the sport, and if you are a huge baseball fan, it plays like a wonderful, heroic tale...even if it all that is achieved is that a middle-aged rookie plants his flag in baseball history. Great acting all around, by Redford, Close, Basinger, Brimley, and Farnsworth. I really want to go break out my mitt and bat right about now. Is there anything more glorious in sports film history than that last home run and the fireworks that ensue?
1001 Movie to See Before You Die
Grade: B 09/09/2009
It is amazing to me that with such a lifelong love for baseball, I have never seen THE NATURAL. I recognize the theme, I knew the name "Wonderboy"...I just never got around to seeing it. This is truly a love letter to the sport, and if you are a huge baseball fan, it plays like a wonderful, heroic tale...even if it all that is achieved is that a middle-aged rookie plants his flag in baseball history. Great acting all around, by Redford, Close, Basinger, Brimley, and Farnsworth. I really want to go break out my mitt and bat right about now. Is there anything more glorious in sports film history than that last home run and the fireworks that ensue?
1001 Movie to See Before You Die
The Terminator
Grade: C- 09/29/2009
If TERMINATOR 2: JUDGEMENT DAY hadn't been a modern, Sci-Fi Masterpiece and TERMINATOR 3: RISE OF THE MACHINES hadn't been such a whiz-bang barrel of fun, the original film may have been a great movie. But the original is totally outdone, in every way, by its successors (even TERMINATOR: SLAVATION). I enjoyed Michael Biehn as Kyle Reese, but the whole film doesn't have the 80s charm...it has the 80s cheesiness. Arnold perfected the robot personna in the second movie...here....he just comes across as an Austrian with a mouth full of marbles. Action is ok, story is ok, but things get so much better later on...and not just technically.
1001 Movie to See Before You Die
Grade: C- 09/29/2009
If TERMINATOR 2: JUDGEMENT DAY hadn't been a modern, Sci-Fi Masterpiece and TERMINATOR 3: RISE OF THE MACHINES hadn't been such a whiz-bang barrel of fun, the original film may have been a great movie. But the original is totally outdone, in every way, by its successors (even TERMINATOR: SLAVATION). I enjoyed Michael Biehn as Kyle Reese, but the whole film doesn't have the 80s charm...it has the 80s cheesiness. Arnold perfected the robot personna in the second movie...here....he just comes across as an Austrian with a mouth full of marbles. Action is ok, story is ok, but things get so much better later on...and not just technically.
1001 Movie to See Before You Die