FIELD OF DREAMS (1989) (****)

Phil Alden Robinson's FIELD OF DREAMS is nostalgic and sentimental and just right. The story, based on W.P. Kinsella's novel, captures the innocence of baseball with an emotional honesty that taps into the generational gap that grew wide during the 1960s. With the conceit of the magical field, the film conjures the notion of simple times when a boy and his dad could share in the game and people of all walks of life could come together in the celebration of the American pastime.

Ray Kinsella (Kevin Costner, DANCES WITH WOLVES) is a farmer in Iowa. The ex-hippie works the family farm with his wife Annie (Amy Madigan, POLLOCK), who he has a young daughter named Karin (Gaby Hoffman, SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE) with. One fateful day in his cornfield, Ray hears a voice say, "If you build it, they will come." Ray becomes obsessed with the voice and is convinced that he needs to build a ball diamond in his cornfield. A classic film image.

Of course the community thinks he's crazy, especially Annie's brother Mark (Timothy Busfield, REVENGE OF THE NERDS). But when the ghost of Shoeless Joe Jackson (Ray Liotta, GOODFELLAS) shows up one night, Ray and Annie are convinced. With the farm close to foreclosure, Ray believes that he is meant to drive to Chicago and take his favorite '60s radical writer Terence Mann (James Earl Jones, COMING TO AMERICA) to a ballgame. Later he will be compelled to visit Dr. Archibald "Moonlight" Graham (Burt Lancaster, FROM HERE TO ETERNITY), a former ball player who only got one at bat in the majors.

Throughout the film we learn about Ray's history with the sport and how that relates to his turbulent relationship with his father John (Dwier Brown, RED DRAGON). His father was a former minor leaguer who tried to relive his glory days through his son. Before he was a teen, Ray had no taste for the sport. Now that he's older, he looks back on the game fondly. Shoeless Joe was the old man's favorite player. On Ray's field, Joe and the rest of the 1919 White Sox, who were paid to throw the World Series, get a chance to play the game again, untainted.

While this is the best baseball film ever made, the film is also one of the great fantasy stories. AFI named it the sixth best American fantasy film. Nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards, the premise allows for the characters to right wrongs from their past. Ray loves the game, but his memory has been tainted over the years. This can be said of Mann and Jackson too.

You can always tell when Costner believes in a project. He believes in baseball, because he's always good when baseball is involved in the role. His awe-shucks optimism allows us to hope the unbelievable is true. Madigan is a firecracker as Ray's supportive wife. She's crucial to the film, because her backing of Ray's wild ideas encourages our support and her concern makes us feel what is at stake. Jones gives a commanding performance as a former activist who is now jaded. His speech close to the end of the film could have been maudlin in the wrong hands, but the joy he injects into each line is pure. Lancaster is graceful as "Moonlight" Graham, a simple man who accomplished a great deal more as a failed ballplayer than if he would have made it in the big leagues.

FIELD OF DREAMS is a weeper for men. But it earns its tears with nuanced characters, perfect plotting and sincerity. What the film makes the viewer believe in is the healing nature of baseball. In reality it could be any activity that a father and son can do together, but baseball puts the film's themes on a larger scale. On rare occasions, even in turbulent times, sports can bring people together. They can make us forget, even if it's only for a short time, our problems. That's the magic that this film conjures, and it makes it feel real.