Movie Magic (Episode 3) - Discussing "The Natural" with Cindy Wheeler

So this is a sports film, as you said, and a lot of people, sports films can be kind of a niche.

Like a lot of times you'd have to be really into a specific sport in order to really enjoy a film.

Is this would you say this is a film that all moviegoers could get something out of who may not be specifically into baseball a whole lot?

I've actually thought about this when I recommend it to people, and I think so.

I think the acting is really good.

I think you've got Robert Redford, Barbara Hershey, Kim Basinger, Glenn Close, Richard Farnsworth.

I mentioned Robert Duvall earlier.

I mean, it's just a star-studded cast.

It's based on a Bernard Malamud book, so it has a little bit of gravity sort of there as well.

It's not just written for the screen.

It's actually, I think, better than the book, which I hardly ever say.

So have you read the book?

I've read parts of it.

I haven't read the whole thing.

But I think it was because it was so different than the book that it sort of put me off.

I still have it, and I pick it up every once in a while, but I don't know.

I don't want to ruin the movie.

Yeah.

I don't want to ruin the movie for myself because I saw this quote where Bernard Malamud told his daughter that he thought that the movie gave him legitimacy as an author.

So he kind of felt like it did him a great service as well from his original, which a lot of people, you know, the endings are very different apparently.

But I hardly ever say that I like the movie better than the book, but I do in this case.