Horse manure

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This article was published 08/10/2010 (5497 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This horse biopic begins with a reading from Scripture and ends with a triumphant gospel number. Possibly, the suggestion is that the celebrated race horse Secretariat was the reincarnation of Jesus Christ.

Certainly, lots of awestruck spectators uttered His name when they saw that horse run and win the 1973 Triple Crown.

The more likely explanation is that this true-life drama is simply striving mightily to hit the American heartland audience square in the heart.

You might say the Christian tone of Secretariat was sired by The Blind Side and cunning Hollywood geneticists.

In any case, the horse’s attributes of heart and stamina are paralleled here in the life of his owner. Penny Chenery (Diane Lane) is a wife and mother of four when she gets word her mother has died, obliging her to return to the sprawling horse-breeding ranch of her senile father (Scott Glenn) to watch over his affairs.

The ranch is losing money, but Penny perseveres, placing her hopes on a couple of pregnant mares. One of the mares foals a red colt dubbed Big Red, who stands on its own wobbly four feet right after being born, a sign of great things in the eyes of the horse’s reluctant trainer Lucien Laurin (John Malkovich).

Laurin, by the way, was French-Canadian, but even an actor as accomplished as Malkovich can’t be bothered to replicate the accent of a Quebecois. Malkovich’s lazy approach is to have his character lapse into high school French when angry.

Possibly this was fine was director Randall Wallace (We Were Soldiers), who may have wanted to downplay the fact that both Secretariat’s trainer and jockey Ron Turcotte (Otto Thorwarth) were Canadian.

In any case, Penny proves to be as inflexible as her helmet hairdo when both her husband and brother try to convince her to sell off Big Red (later dubbed Secretariat) and cut the losses on the farm. In times of particular stress, Penny takes the horse aside and looks him in the eye and communicates by some equine telepathy. In these scenes, when director Wallace attempts to crowbar your emotions, it’s difficult not to laugh.

Given that any of the film’s synopses will mention Secretariat’s claim to fame — winning the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes to score a rare Triple Crown — the movie strives to create suspense by other means, including the suggestion that the horse’s heart may explode from its all-out efforts.

It ultimately all feels bogus and a little sad, really, for such a triumphant tale

There was undoubtedly a more elegant, honest way to tell the story of this remarkable racehorse. Wallace chooses to lay on the shmaltz like asphalt.

 

randall.king@freepress.mb.ca

Movie review

Secretariat

Starring Diane Lane and John Malkovich

Globe, Grant Park, Kildonan Place, Polo Park, St. Vital

G

2 out of 5 stars