Our 12 Favorite Farmers on Film
Crop circles, talking pigs, hearing voices in the field--the things Hollywood farmers have to put up with!
Crop circles, talking pigs, hearing voices in the field–the things Hollywood farmers have to put up with!
We know that farming isn’t like it is in the movies, but we can’t help but get lost in Hollywood’s version of the rural life. Whether it’s a completely different world or a land not all that far away, a farmer’s story seems to stand out in films.
Here are 12 of our favorite farmers on film:
Kevin Costner as Ray Kinsella in ‘Field of Dreams’
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The plot might focus on baseball, but the action takes place in corn fields.
Favorite farm quote: “It’s just I’ve heard that sometimes farmers in the field … They hear things. You know, voices.”
James Cromwell as Arthur Hoggett in ‘Babe’
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Sure the pig steals the show, but Hoggett is always silently by his side.
Favorite farm quote: “That’ll do, pig. That’ll do.”
Paul Rudd as Ned in ‘Our Idiot Brother’
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Every family should have a bio-dynamic pot-growing farmer.
Favorite farm quote: “I’ve got to get back to work on the tomonion — it’s a cross pollination between a tomato and an onion. Think of the time it’ll save when you’re making spaghetti sauce.”
Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker in ‘Star Wars’
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A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away you farmed things like moisture. Luke was raised on the Lars family moisture farm until he was 19.
Favorite farm quote: “Traveling through hyperspace ain’t like dusting crops, boy!”
Mel Gibson as Rev. Graham Hess in ‘Signs’
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What’s more controversial than GMOs? Crop circles.
Favorite farm quote: Officer Caroline: “What kind of a machine bends a stalk of corn without breaking it?”
Graham Hess: “It can’t be by hand, it’s too perfect.”
Zac Effron and Dennis Quad as Dean and Henry Whippie in ‘At Any Price’
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Speaking of GMOs, this portrayal of modern-day agribusiness centers around a farmer (Quaid), who plants and sells genetically modified seeds, and his son (Effron) who doesn’t want to join the family business. Roger Ebert reviewed the film before he died calling it “brave, layered” and compared it to the next film on our list.
Favorite farm quote: “Am I a happy man? How can I not be?”
Henry Fonda as Tom Joad in ‘Grapes of Wrath’
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A young man returns home to his family’s farm after a stay in prison. It’s a grim movie, but (spoiler alert!) at least the movie’s ending is a little happier than the novel.
Favorite farm quote: “I been thinking about us, too, about our people living like pigs and good rich land layin’ fallow. Or maybe one guy with a million acres and a hundred thousand farmers starvin’. And I been wonderin’ if all our folks got together and yelled…”
Sally Field as Edna Spalding in ‘Places in the Heart’
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We like her. We really like her as a farmer. Also depression era farming was no fun.
Favorite farm quote: “Right on my biscuit!”
Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray as Betty and Bob MacDonald in ‘The Egg and I’
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A city couple buys a chicken farm. Hilarity ensues.
Favorite farm quote: Bob MacDonald: “Right about August, we can begin to figure out more important offspring. Maybe five or six hundred of them.”
Betty MacDonald: (shocked) “Five or six hundred what?”
Bob MacDonald: “Why, chicks of course.”
Billy Bob Thornton as Charles Farmer in ‘The Astronaut Farmer’
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He’s a farmer who wants to be an astronaut. So he builds a rocket in the barn. What could go wrong?
Favorite farm quote: “We’ve gotta get this space cowboy’s head out of the clouds.”
Geena Davis and Lori Petty as Dottie Hinson and Kit Keller in ‘A League of Their Own’
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They left one field for another, but they were always milkmaids to us.
Favorite farm quote: “Hey cowgirls, see the grass? Don’t eat it.”
Pauly Shore as Crawl in ‘Son-in-Law’
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The family farm was never the same.
Favorite farm quote: “Fresh off the farm, oh my God, I can’t believe it. Right across the hallway. Hallelujah. So you’re inbred?”
Bonus: Harrison Ford as John Book in ‘Witness’
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He’s not really a farmer; he’s a cop, who’s pretending to be an Amish farmer to protect a young boy who witnesses a murder. But we love the way he fumbles through his farming duties, proving how difficult the job is — particularly without modern technology.
Favorite farm quote: Jan Rubes: “You never had your hands on a teat before?”
John Book: “Not one this big.”
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by Gloria Dawson, Modern Farmer
August 23, 2013
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