Hey guys, Ryle here with Watch This Instead for Friday, October 8 and today I saw Secretariat which is a by the books traditional, old fashion base on an inspiration true story Disney drama that I guess you needed to be told into that no ones ever made the movie about this particular horse before. Secretariat is directed by Randall Wallace, the guy who is probably most famous for writing the screenplay for Brave Heart and Pearl Harbor. It stars Diane Lane and John Malkovich the name of few there is bunch of let the people that you will recognize at the movie for instance Lafayette from true blood. Diane Lane a housewife who’s mother death and fathers failing health draw her back into the family business of horse breading and then after her father’s farm she takes the range upon intended and sees her underdog hole go onto win the 1973 triple crown. The movie is filled with inspiring speeches about never giving up and running your own race unpredictably against all odds. Diane Lane as this simple housewife you know it’s nothing about horse racing goes on to show everybody including her doubting husband and brother that she’s got what it takes and she has the spirit and the gumption to win.
The film is hopelessly safe and it doesn’t really add anything new to the inspirational horse racing movie genre. Although some of the footage of the actual racing is really cool even though the quality of that footage looks completely different from the rest of the film which is kind of weird. And boy is Diane Lane ever gorgeous in a classic Hollywood kind of way. She is completely believable and fits right in to her role as a late 1960’s upper class housewife, even though she delivers probably the most forgettable performance of her carrier. And speaking of performances John Malkovic makes this phase for most of the movie. Ultimately though, the film only really succeed that the historical drama in that this is something that actually happen to this people this one time. Beyond regurgitating factual events, the film didn’t really do much to inspire me. Overall the film feels kind of patch together in certain parts with no real drives behind it and there is some really weird musical queues that kind of made me to do.
Yes it was story of a woman overcoming the odds and the man world and yes, it’s the story of the horse that one on to break all this crazy records but ultimately the film just kind of reeds as a story about racing horses. A pastime in which the super rich buy and trained this gigantic beast to race against other gigantic beast own and trained by other rich people, it’s not exactly a world that I can easily relay too, so as a film maker if you are going to trying to inspire me a common peasant you are going to have to work a little bit harder encrypting your film. The old fashion by the books Disney drama formula doesn’t really cut it and in the end Secretariat just comes across as blond. Instead you should watch predictably enough Seabiscuit, basically the inspirational horse racing movie genre stops there. If directed by Garry Ross and it’s said in the great depression, it stars Tobey Maguire as a blind in one eye panelist jockey it’s also stars Chris Cooper as a homeless guy who is the horse trainer. And stars Jeff Bridges as the owner of the horse whose son gets in a car accident which drives into deep, deep depression, plus the movie is about Seabiscuit and undersize through drag racing horse from the 30’s that went on to achieve unexpected success and fame and help to left up the spirits of the American people who needed it at that time. Gorgeous Cinematography spot on our direction in costume helps to selves it’s a incredible story and then underdog horse and the team behind it. Ultimately resulting in an inspirational horse racing movie home run, you also watch Viggo Mortensen in Hidalgo which is also pretty inspirational and under rated it, yes it’s me. But the bottom line is unless you’re looking for a straight up history lesson of early 1970’s American horse racing I would avoid going to see Secretariat.