Sally Field, you deserve better than this

Just the other day, I was thinking about how much I have enjoyed Sally Field’s performances through the years.

I was charmed by her earliest parts: her winsome performances opposite leading men Jeff Bridges (Stay Hungry) and Burt Reynolds (Smokey and the Bandit, its first sequel, and its assorted copycats). Then, without losing her spunk and spirit, Field demonstrated that she had sufficient reserves of seriousness to play a purposeful union advocate (Norma Rae) and, most touchingly, a sheriff’s widow who summons the strength to retain her house and her family amid the Great Depression (Places in the Heart). Those two parts netted her Oscars, for which, on the basis of her “You like me” acceptance speech for the latter, she was evidently most grateful.

And perhaps because she was always more fetching than stunning, Field transitioned fairly painlessly to more (how to put this?) seasoned parts. Twice, she embodied America’s idealized