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SEABISCUIT
6/10
USA 2003
: Gary ROSS : 140 mins
Seabiscuit
the movie has much in common with Seabiscuit the horse – both overcome
slow starts to stage improbable late rallies that carry them victoriously
over the line. But while the thoroughbred wins most of his races with
something to spare, it’s a tight photo for the film: Ross’s grindingly
old-fashioned, thuddingly ‘inspirational’ approach nearly nobbles a true
story so implausible that, if fictional, would surely be laughed off the
screen.
In a mid-30s
America struggling to escape the Depression, automobile-millionaire Charles
Howard (Jeff Bridges) employs old-school horseman Tom Smith (Chris Cooper)
to find him a champion thoroughbred. Smith selects the undersized, temperamental,
apparently talentless Seabiscuit, and the half-blind journeyman Red Pollard
(Tobey Maguire) as his jockey. The rest is racing history: though initially
a slow learner, Seabiscuit’s run of victories in big California handicaps
captures the imagination of the public – setting up a match-race with
east-coast blueblood Triple Crown hero War Admiral. The David-and-Goliath
contest duly takes place, with pulsating and unlikely results - but turns
out to be merely a prelude to the amazing final chapter in Seabiscuit’s
career.
Writer-director
Ross takes a ‘Harry
Potter’ approach to Laura Hillenbrand’s 2001 non-fiction
bestseller – this is an over-reverent handling of a book beloved by its
many vocal fans. Condensing a hefty tome to reasonable feature length,
he deploys old-fashioned techniques: on-screen captions telling us where
and when we are; close-ups of newspaper headlines and photos; copious
narration (by David McCullough) often accompanying monochrome stills of
Depression-hit Americans. The results would have looked old- hat back
during Seabiscuit’s prime – Robert Redford’s hopelessly square 1920s golf
picture The Legend
of Bagger Vance comes to mind and Ross’s movie could be described
pedigree-wise as being ‘by Bagger Vance out of National Velvet’,
so shamelessly is the corn ladled out.
Then again,
the Seabiscuit story – described by whiskey-swigging racecourse commentator
“Tick Tock” McGlaughlin (William H Macy, excellent as the movie’s vital
comic relief) as ‘The Little Engine That Could’ – does lend itself to
Ross’s emphatically manipulative, classy-sugary style, aided and abetted
as he is by Randy Newman’s exuberant score and cinematographer John Schwartzman’s
chocolate-box-beautiful visuals. The film does, apparently, pretty much
adhere to the facts – though reports that Seabiscuit and War Admiral were
actually the same size are worrying, given so much play is made of how
the “18-hand” ‘Admiral’ towers over his “15-hand” rival.
Such elaborations**,
while hardly necessary, are forgivable – this is a film designed to be
an all-out crowdpleaser, and functions well enough in that regard. The
performances are solid across the board: Bridges, Cooper, Maguire and
Macy are all in good form, and the less-familiar faces of Elizabeth Banks
(as Howard’s wife) and real-life top jockey Gary Stevens (as the pilot
who takes over on Seabiscuit when Pollard is injured) acquit themselves
well. But it’s glaringly noticeable that, while Seabiscuit’s owner(s),
jockey(s) and trainer have proper roles, his groom Sam – who would have
spent more time with the nag than the rest of them combined – is relegated
to the sidelines. This is especially unfortunate (and troubling) as Sam
happens to be the film’s only non-white character – actor Kingston DuCoeur*
is African-American. Until very late on, Sam is sufficiently mute to make
viewers wonder whether Ross has transferred over to him trainer Smith’s
legendary wordlessness, Cooper being much chattier than the book’s “Silent”
Smith. If this is supposed to be a deliberate echo of the past – how 1930s
movies presented non-white characters – then it’s all too disturbingly
effective.
And on a wider
level, Seabiscuit is yet another example of a billion-dollar studio
cranking out a triumph-of-the-underdog parable – even though the “upstart”
Dreamworks is, relatively speaking, still ‘the little studio that could’
in major-league Hollywood terms. Sumptuous in every aspect of its production
design and showing off its considerable budget at every opportunity, the
film is itself much more of a War Admiral than a Seabiscuit. In a fair
and ideal world, poetic justice would be served if an “upstart” low-budgeter
came from nowhere to pip it at the box-office and the Oscars: notably
unsentimental French man-and-horse drama Mister
V., for example. American audiences will probably never get the
chance to make the comparison, of course: the way cinema and the world
have developed since 1938, the Seabiscuits of today are lucky to make
it into the starting stalls, never mind get even the faintest sniff of
the winning post.
Nicholas
Arcane
6th
November, 2003 (seen same day : UGC Boldon)
* Reportedly
a ‘veteran singer-songwriter-actor’, DuCoeur is also known Carl M Craig,
and his personal motto – not inappropriate given the circumstances – is
apparently “Function in disaster, finish in style.”
** Apparently
this isn’t the only “embellishment” effected by Ross. According to a letter
in the Racing Post of 9th November (“Were orders given
not to break The Biscuit?”, by Michael Tanner), “Seabiscuit was never
more than half a length off the lead throughout [his final] race.”
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