Should be even better than a "10"

Rating: 10/10 (9 February 2007)

I recently saw this film - I never tire of seeing it again - with a friend who visited me for a weekend. He and I had played baseball together in college, and he's as big a baseball fan as I am. But for some inexplicable reason, he'd never seen this film, so we watched my DVD on a Saturday afternoon.
First, it's far and away the best baseball flick, ever - not because "Pride of the Yankees," "The Rookie," "Bull Durham," or "For Love of the Game" weren't excellent - but because it is such a terrific story, and because Robert Redford gives a sensational performance, and can really look like a talented pro in swinging a bat and throwing/fielding a baseball. (Incidentally, of the above movies, the last Costner film didn't gain the popularity of praise of the others, but I still found it excellent, and like Redford, Kevin can handle a bat and ball.)
Since I'd watched the film just shortly before this visit, I looked for any details I might have missed before, instead of getting totally absorbed by the story.
I noticed that despite his being presented as a multi-million-dollar bookie/gambler, wagering six figured amounts (in the depression 1930's, yet!) Darrin McGavin's "Gus." never drew the right bead on Roy Hobbs, and seemed to have a stupidly naive perspective with regard to his prodigious talent, and losing betting against Roy throughout.
Also, Robert Duvall's "Max," the syndicated columnist, presents himself as a tower of virtue to preserve the integrity of the game, yet is friendly with Gus, who is involved in bribes to players to throw games to aid his confederate (Robert Prosky) and presumably also to clean-up in the betting arena. Even though Duvall's character obviously is ambitious to break the big, inside story, and is self-promoting, it seems his character would have been a bit fairer and more discreet.
These two are still great actors, and their characters strong and interesting, despite any such inconsistencies.
And the baseball scenes are terrific, in and of themselves, and provide a completely authentic representation of baseball five decades earlier than when filmed, and seven decades ago now.
Some purists have criticized the ethereal, surreal aspects in the film as detracting from the baseball games portrayed. I disagree, and feel that these added immensely (even necessarily) to the "story," without in anyway detracting from the outstanding "on the field" parts of the movie.
Like Dennis Quaid in "The Rookie," Redford was in his late forties at filming, portraying a character about a decade younger. Like Quaid, no problem for him; and had the character been even a few years more junior to him, he'd have been just as believable.
This film, along with "North Dallas Forty" and "One-on-One"/"Hoosiers" (a tie) comprise the far best films about our big-three sports. While there have been many excellent films about baseball, football and basketball, these are the absolute finest.