Let me start by saying that Secretariat is certainly family-friendly. I noticed
plenty of children in the audience who were cheering throughout and enjoying
themselves overall, so if you're looking for that, then by all means see this
movie.
But
Secretariat is not
going to leave you feeling satisfied. In many ways, the film wasn't really even
about the horse. Instead, the central character was Penny Tweedy, the owner of
Secretariat. And that's where it lost its magic.
Disney
took an amazing story and gave it a squeaky-clean persona. As I said afterwards, if Mr. and Mrs.
Tweedy never had a real fight once over the many years that Secretariat was
racing, I'd like to see a movie on that. Everything was too perfect. As a
result the events appear fake and forced, and the story seem muddled and
unfocused.
The
film also took forever to get to its point. There's a reason why this horse is
so special, and I didn't need drawn-out suspense to understand that. The drama
in the film was elevated to a degree that was unreal. Personally, because of
this, I questioned the authenticity of specific events.
In
addition, the film's supporting cast had no real substance. Penny's family was stuck in awkwardly,
her friends always carried the same emotions, and we were never given a real
chance to connect with the horse. In comparison, Diane Lane was fine as Penny
Tweedy, until we saw the actual person. The differences in the two were unusual
to say the least.
Secretariat relied too much on
typical film techniques to sway the audience one way or another. The camera
zoomed in on important documents, and the actors spelled out things the average
person might not know about horse breeding or racing. Even more so, there were
these two reporters, one played by Kevin Connolly, who the entire time made
comments meant to tell the audience how to feel. It was overdone and
unnecessary to say the least.
Although
I have plenty to say about the faults of Secretariat, it can't be denied that it worked as a gentle
family-film. If only Disney hadn't cleaned it up to an extreme, perhaps itcould've retained its magic.
