Speaking of the acting, FOD has a grand cast. Even though Costner usually is the only ‘big’ actor in his movies, FOD has many amazing and gifted actors supporting him. Joining Costner in his romp through corn fields is Amy Madigan, who plays his wife Annie. The Shoeless Joe Jackson is played, quite convincingly, by Ray Liotta. Burt Lancaster plays Dr. Archibald “Moonlight” Graham, a real-life former MLB player who had literally less than five minutes in the bigs. The cast is rounded out by the formidable James Earl Jones, who plays Terence 'Terry' Mann.
The only other worthwhile thing in FOD would be the luscious and encompassing Iowa countryside. The movie, which was mostly shot on location, is full of this lush farmland, acres of corn, and a real baseball diamond. This imagery actually draws the viewer into the movie itself, and leads to the bit of credibility that it has.
Speaking of the looks, the transfer of FOD to Blu-ray is not exactly up to par. The movie keeps the original grainy film, which made it look horrific on my HDTV. Though the movie is better than on film, the look is roughly that of when it was on DVD. For a movie of this cult standing, FOD deserved a much better transfer. The only thing good about the film transfer was that the Iowa countryside was still vibrant and stunning and the fact that the black levels were properly deep. Frankly, it almost looks as though this was a DVD, not a BD.
The sound, on the other hand, was extremely well done. Using all of my surround-sound speakers, the sound was perfect perfect. I heard whispers coming from behind me, the whistle of a baseball as it flew by, and all of the action on the screen. The audio was also extremely well balanced, as I lost no dialog or sounds throughout the movie. I actually found the score to be quite moving, which is surprising considering the plot and the script.
As for extras, there are two featurettes, a look at the "real Field of Dreams," a scrap book, some storyboarding, the typical deleted scenes and audio commentary, and a roundtable discussion between Costner and some former baseball greats. None of the Blu-ray edition extras are new, as everything is on the DVD version or the Laserdisc version. This is stupid, as one point a Blu-ray release is to get DVD owners to upgrade, but by giving them nothing new, there is no reason to. Almost all of the extras are self-congratulatory and useless drivel, none of which are worth the time to see. Well, almost none of them. The deleted scenes are actually somewhat interesting (for once), as they reveal more of the interactions between Ray and his father.
Article comments