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If you build it...

Posted by ESC on May 03, 2001

In Reply to: What's the meaning? posted by Steven Miracle on May 03, 2001

: Does anyone know the origin of the phrase, "if you build it, they will come"?

I don't know if this was the first use.

Field of Dreams
By Roger Ebert
www.suntimes.com/ ebert/ebert_reviews/1989/04/349987.html
"The farmer is standing in the middle of a cornfield when he hears the voice for the first time: 'If you build it, he will come.' He looks around and doesn't see anybody. The voice speaks again, soft and confidential: 'If you build it, he will come.' Sometimes you can get too much sun, out there in a hot Iowa cornfield in the middle of the season. But this isn't a case of sunstroke.

Up until the farmer starts hearing voices, 'Field of Dreams' is a completely sensible film about a young couple who want to run a family farm in Iowa. Ray and Annie Kinsella (Kevin Costner and Amy Madigan) have tested the fast track and had enough of it, and they enjoy sitting on the porch and listening to the grass grow. When the voice speaks for the first time, the farmer is baffled, and so was I: Could this be one of those religious pictures where a voice tells the humble farmer where to build the cathedral?."

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