Mann calls his family to assure them he's alive and he's headed to Iowa with a man named Ray Kinsella.
Later Mann goes into the corn. Does he die? Does his body disappear? now his family knows where he went and with whom. Won't they send the cops to ask Ray where Mann is?
He died. It was his time. He probably didn't call his father. Like much of this story, it's bittersweet.
shareMann didnt Die... the whole reason for haviing Mann was for him to come back and tell the story and write about it.
"If I have the courage...Oh what a story it will make". It is his rebirth as has given up writing.
If you think he dies you missed the whole purpose of the movie.
I just thought there were rules. Ray couldn't go where Mann went because of the rules. But if there is an exception for Mann, so be it.
shareNo Ray wasnt invited. Becuase the whole purpose of the movie was Ray's reconnection with his Father; besides fullfilling Archies dream and giving Mann motivation to write again those are the three themes.
Ray did his part and now Joe wants him to stay to meet his father again; introduce to his family and play a game of catch.
Mann's purpose was to experience the afterlife of the cornfield and return to write about it and spread the word. Thus "If I have the courage to go through with this....Oh what a story this will make" then Ray says something like "You going to write about it?" as has been like 25 years since he wrote besides childrens books. Mann then says "Yes of course".
Yeah, I got all that. I just figured Mann would be writing about it in his new life. I mean, if Mann could come back, then why wouldn't Ray be invited? He could play catch with his father and see the other side. And if Mann can go and return, then why can't Doc step out and return?
These are rhetorical questions. I'm too literal sometimes. Mann is going to write about it back here in the real world. I like that better. Makes more sense.
Also the rules you may have been infering to or mislead by apply to Archie who is already part of the afterlife and infact already dead.
Archie is transformed into younger self to help fullfill his story ... but full circle he is really there to save Ray's daughter. This points out how all things in life are connected.
Once he steps off field he transforms back to older self in order to Save Karen. The younger Archie wasnt even aware of any medical knowledge he would get later in life. And although its a stretch but the way movie portraited .. Young archie didnt realize he was dead or in the "future" he thought he was in the 1920's.
Once he transformed back to old Doc Graham he was aware of everything. Him not being able to go back was not going back to cornfield "heaven??" ... but couldnt go back to younger archie.
The fact that younger archie existed outside the ballfield is inconsistent with the rest of the players. But that exception to this fantasy logic was required to create the loop of Doc Graham ... young archie ... the game...back to Doc Graham...save karen.
Story is multi-layered about father/son, baseball, faith; magical; etc. but really could be god/heaven or some other magical force in universe that brings things together in a joined fate??
He and Ray were talking as if he were coming back. Ray wanted a full description of what it was like. Also, Mann was talking about writing about his experience.
If it turned out he died, then Shoeless Joe just basically murdered him.
See I figured he'd died or was dying so thats why he was invited to the corn. If he came back it would be as a ghost and be able to explain things to Ray.
I just think it'd be weird - they think he's missing but he's not he calls and says he's headed for Iowa with a guy named Ray Kinsella. Then they never hear from him again. You know his family would send the cops to Iowa and how do you explain his disappearance? He walked off into the corn w/ all these dead baseball players.
Maybe I watch too much Dateline but I think they'd arrest Ray as having something to do with the disappearance.
Send the cops because a grown man son doesn't check in with his father? Hmmm, might they have more important things to worry about? And Ray would just tell him that he walked in to the cornfields.
shareExactly. It it was meant for him to die, they would likely have it stated that he had cancer or something, then it would make sense for him to die at the end. But they talk as if he's coming back, and this is basically just a rejuvenation. He'll come back and write about everything, and this will help facilitate people to come to the field. People are more likely to believe a well-known writer than just a regular guy, no matter how much he plugs his own field.
shareI've wondered about that too, but I don't think we're meant to interpret it as Terrence dying. After all, he tell Ray he intends to write about it. I think that was the whole purpose of his being at the field, to have an experience that will get him to write again. The pain Ray was supposed to ease was Terrence's inability to write, not (as Ray had believed) the fact that he hadn't been to a baseball game in so many years. With all three messages Ray gets, he gets the meaning of the message wrong, yet still manages to do what he's supposed to do.
shareThat's ridiculous, he doesn't get each message wrong. And taking Terence (one r, by the way) to a baseball game, right in the city he lives in, precisely did have the effect of helping to ease his pain, even if that wasn't the only thing that might have done so.
shareRay may have accomplished what he believed he was meant to do after each message, but in each case he completely missed the greater purpose behind each one. Terence may have missed going to ballgames, but the true source of his pain was the disillusionment that caused him to stop writing. Going to the game didn't by itself ease his pain; he wanted to leave almost as soon as they got there. It did, however, set him on the trajectory that led to his traveling to Iowa with Ray, which is where he found inspiration to begin writing again. Taking Terence to the game was the right thing for Ray to do because it set Terence on the path that would ease his pain, but Ray misunderstood the real meaning of it.
Likewise, both he and Terence misinterpreted the command to "Go the distance." They thought it meant going to Minnesota to find Doc Graham, not knowing he had died years before. Their trip did however lead to their encounter with Graham's spirit and ultimately led to all three making their way to Iowa and fulfilling their individual purposes. And of course, Ray completely missed the purpose of "If you build it, he will come." Joe Jackson did play on the field as he'd believed, but the he the voice was referring to was Ray's father.
Ray never excluded the notion that the he would be his father, even if he considered it, on a certain level, to be Joe Jackson or whomever else at any point. You are glossing over the "Go the distance" message by not revealing what happened at each stop. They go to MN to discover and learn about Graham, who they end up picking up on their way back to Iowa (something you left out), and who ends up saving the life of their daughter because he's a doctor (obviously an essential part of the story, gleaned in MN), which results in her now being able to meet her grandfather.
shareI like to think of Mann not as dying - there is no physical death involved - but as going "somewhere else". Other examples include -- spoiler alert -- Frodo (and others) sailing away at the end of The Return of the King in Lord of the Rings to the Undying Lands and figures in the Bible that are simply "translated" if you will in to heaven, and do not die. I think there are only a couple examples of them in the Bible - Elijah, for example.
shareI think it's one of those endings to me where people can be open to interpretation. I still hear people wondering whether "Old Rose" dies at the end of "Titanic" as an example. Some people say "yes", some people say "no". I always took it as Terence Mann going into the "other world", heaven or whatever you want to call it.
If you're not taking any steps forward, you're not moving at all.
I think it's one of those endings to me where people can be open to interpretation.
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I agree with this, but do you think it's possible that the staircase scene at the end of Titanic could refer to her actual spirit being reunited in heaven with Jack and those good people from the ship? I never thought of it as her "final dream" before she passed, but rather the bittersweet sense that her spirit goes on and goes to be with those who cared about her.
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Yes, I'm definitely on board the theory that she has died, warm in her bed as alluded to shortly beforehand. And the staircase sequence was just her entrance into heaven, getting things in order with Jack (the #1 thing/person on her mind throughout her life. Her first love). Presumably, after this grand reuniting with Jack, she would go on to also be with others in her life who had passed, but this scene was just the beginning.
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