Apparently, there is a *widely held notion that Terence Mann died at some point during the trip. I didn’t know this until I looked at the movie on IMDB. Here is the IMDB message board on the subject.
Any thoughts???
*Apparently including James Earl Jones!
Odd. I don’t recall hearing anything about that on the copious commentaries and interviews on the DVD. When was he supposed to have died?
In the original novel, Terrance Mann is JD Sallinger.
I don’t think Terrance was dead at the begining. I don’t remember the line exactly but Joe invites him to go out with them and Ray questions the use of the word out. And then Terrance says something about courage to go through with it. I always thought that part meant that by going into the fields with Shoeless Joe, Terrance went willingly to his death so he could see what was beyond.
This is funny. I purchased the 15 year anniversary DVD of Field of Dreams and was on that exact IMDB message board and was thinking of posting a thread dealing with this exact same issue :D.
When I saw the movie originally, I didn’t think Mann was dead. Now, I think that perhaps when he walks into the corn he dies (which is why he says to Ray that he has a family to think of). To say he was dead since the beginning would require TOO much of a leap of faith (I know… sounds silly to say with this movie ;)) to believe.
Heh. I just picked up the anniversary edition myself. It has never been my impression that Mann was dead, but I always thought it was obvious he died when he went into the corn (voluntarily, of course).
Now, looking back on it from a sort of Sixth Sense perspective, I suppose it’s possible Mann may have died earlier, either in his apartment or somewhere on the road - but the fact is he interacts with several people in Chisholm while researching Moonlight Graham, so that doesn’t quite hold up. I suppose he could have died somewhere on the way, but Mark (Annie Kinsella’s brother - the one who doesn’t see any of the magic until Doc Graham saves Ray’s little girl) does see Mann and asks Ray who he is.
So. I’m not convinced the moviemakers intended that angle, but of course it’s open to the interpretation of the viewer.
But didn’t Mann say he needed to go so that he could write about it and tell people about it? That would certainly imply that he was coming back.
Hmm. Yes, that’s true. I was thinking along the lines of the players’ re-entry through the cornfield making their return from the dead possible. By extension, that would mean Mann could come back the same way - but I don’t know how he would write about it if he couldn’t leave the field afterwards (unless he dictated). But remember Mann does try to dissuade Ray from going into the cornfield by saying “For God’s sake; I’m unattached - you have a family.” So it seems obvious there’s something more drastic than just a visit in store for him.
First, remember that Terence Mann is J.D. Salinger. In W.P. Kinsella’s book, Ray Kinsella kidnaps the real-life recluse J.D. Salinger. Only threats of legal action forced Philip Alden Robinson to change Salinger into a fictitious character named Terence Mann. Now, you think there was ever an intent to kill J.D. Salinger? I strongly doubt it!
The whole experience was based on W.P. Kinsella’s desire to see his hero, Salinger, get over his issues and start writing again. So it is with Mann. For him, the trip to the cornfield doesn’t represent death, it represents fresh inspiration to become a great writer again.
This may be true of the novel, but the film adaptation is quite another creature. Phil Alden Robinson changed many things from the novel to the screen, and in so doing, concentrated the story more upon Ray and his father than anything having to do with Salinger in the source material. While there are certainly parallels, I don’t believe there is a direct cross-reference between Salinger and Mann, as that element of the original novel was substantially changed.
That said, it’s still (as I said) open to interpretation. I don’t believe the “Rapture of Terence Mann” (or anything relating to the Mann character directly) is the focus of the film at all. So one is free to believe whatever one likes about the fate of Terence Mann without impact on the overarching story.
I never thought he died. That was the point of the hesitation. Clearly the ghosts were coming from “other” than the corn field. They’ve invited him to join them. He goes out, turns and hesitates, laughs and goes in. He wasn’t dead and wasn’t sure what he would find.
Not only that, but aren’t the players becoming more corporeal? At first, only Ray and his family could see them. Then Terence Mann could. They picked up Doc Graham, and he wasn’t even at the field. And he was able to leave it as an old man. Then later, Ray’s brother in law could see them. And finally, thousands of people are coming to watch them play. All the rules are being rewritten as we watch. I never got the sense at all that Terence Mann was going to die. I had the sense that he was going with them to see something truly wonderful that he could come back and share with the world. The bit about Ray not going because he has a family is probably because no one knows what he’ll find on the other side, and it’s not worth the risk or the worry to his wife and children.
I get the sense in the movie that no less than the hand of God is at work. Ray is transported through time, Doc Graham is resurrected as a young man then becomes old again… Miraculous events are happening, and Terence Mann is involved in part so he can explain it to the world. That’s why he was chosen to go in the first place. Ray’s gift of being reunited with his father is his reward for building the field and bringing Terence Mann to them.
But really, all of it is oblique enough that you can see multiple meanings and motivations and reasons. That’s often the way it goes with great stories.
First, while I agree that Terence Mann is not J.D. Salinger, I believe that’s more a result of necessity than of Philip Alden Robinson’s artistic choice. J.D. Salinger made it clear that he wouldn’t stand for seeing himself (or a charcter that resembled him too closely) on screen.
And really, who can blame him? I realize that Salinger MAY well be a genuine nut case, but even if he were the sanest, healthiest man on Earth, I think it’s understandable that a writer who’s beloved by every fruitcake from John Hinckley to Mark David Chapman would be disturbed by a book/movie about a guy hearing voices telling him to kidnap J.D. Salinger! I mean, Salinger has fans who’d make Stephen King’s “Misery” look like a Harlequin romance! The last thing he needs is a movie giving such crackpots ideas!
Second, I happen to think “Field of Dreams” is, on the whole, a LOT better than the novel it’s based on. W.P. Kinsella’s work is smug and disdainful. Robinson’s vision is a little more humane.
IIRC, in interviews Salinger’s said that he’s still writing, he just refuses to publish anything because he’s afraid of what the world will do with his works.
Robert Heinlein once stated that writing soon becomes a monkey on your back, you have keep writing or your start to feel physically ill.
Oh, absolutely. I just think Robinson took that artistic choice and wound up making drastic changes to the story, whether as a result of the necessity or not, that shifted the focus entirely.
I agree wholeheartedly. Although my perception may have been colored by my recall of the film (I saw it before I read the novel), I’ve always thought Field of Dreams was much more lyrical than Shoeless Joe.
Terrance Mann is not dead. He is invited into the field so he can write about it on his return. He says those things about how Ray has a family when Ray asks ‘What’s in it for ME!’ and of course he doesn’t know yet that his Dad is taking a really long time to get out of his catcher’s gear.
There is also the issue of time. Nobody knows how much time a visitor will spend in the field. Maybe time moves differently. In any case it’s not safe for Ray, who is a father, to go into the field.
I have no doubt that once Mann comes out of the corn he will be able to leave the field because Moonlight Grahm was able to leave baseball to become his ‘true’ self of Doc Grahm. So Mann will be able to leave to become his true self and be the writer.
That’s what I thought, he’s taking a “leave of absence” which he can do, no one is depending on him to make sure they have enough to eat or a roof over their heads. In contrast, Ray’s quick trip out to get Terrence cost the family enough, he can’t go away for any period of time. He needs to stay where he is. Terrence just has his dad - with whom he’s already checked in.
Plus, if he was dead, I’d be a bawling wreck at the end of the movie - and I’m bad enough as it is.
But Doc Graham was also dead :D. The question of ‘true’ self is open for debate, however. Is the true self the doctor or the baseball player?
But his young ghost started off field. Ray and Terrance pick him up hitch-hiking.
Grahm’s true self is the doctor.
Ray
You came this close to your dream. Most people would call that a tragedy.
Doc Grahm
If I only got to be a doctor for one day, that would be a tragedy.
Terrance gets to go because he is invited. Because he did give that interview. He loves the game and he loves writing so the players invite him back so he can write about it. He’s not dead. It’s like the end of Star Trek The Motion Picture or 2001. Terrance Mann is alive and he will come back. If anything Mann was ‘dead’ at the beginning of the film. He is locked away from the world and doesn’t want to venture out because he wants privacy. But when he goes to the game nobody notices him. Nobody ever says, ‘Hey aren’t you Terrance Mann?’ Ray gets him out of his apartment and he never goes back.
Now if only someone would get me out of my apartment.
The only way it could make sense is if he was always dead.
Ray goes to Boston and meets the Ghost of Terrance Mann.
In Boston nobody seems to see the Mann except for Ray. (hot dog sellers at the game ect.)
Mann does talk to the people in MN. He interviews everybody about Doc.
But he never changes clothes, he doesn’t pack any clothes for the trip. It could be that his apartment was some sort of limbo.
Or maybe since Field of Dreams came out there have been too many movies where “HE/THEY were dead all along!!!” have come out and that’s why we are rethinking it now.
Yes, Mann said that he was going to write about what he saw… But did he say for what audience? I never had any doubt, any of the times I saw the movie, that Mann was not coming back. For Terrence Mann, walking into the cornfield was the same irreversible decision that Moonlight Graham made when he stepped off the ballfield.
And I don’t think that he was literally dead at the start of the movie, either (no burial, no obituary, etc… If nothing else, Ray would have read the obituary. But I can see the argument that he was metaphorically dead, being locked up in his apartment away from the world. Certainly he didn’t literally die on the trip itself, as that would have been… awkward.