Seabiscuit Is Picture Perfect© Greg Melikov
Aug 21, 2003
Seabiscuit the Movie is a winner just like Seabiscuit the Book. The success of each, however, is for different reasons.
Bestseller "Seabiscuit: An American Legend" was based wholly on fact and told extremely well by Laura Hillenbrand. Three diverse characters and an unruly, misunderstood racehorse get together to create history during Depression America:
Charles Howard: A former bicycle repairman who became sole distributor of Buick and Oldsmobile in the West. He (Jeff Bridges) paid $7,000 for Seabiscuit.
Tom Smith: A virtually silent mustang breaker who came from the vanishing frontier with little experience training thoroughbreds. He (Charles Cooper) had a rapport with horses.
John "Red" Pollard: The half-blind jockey who retired from the ring a beaten fighter. He (Tobey Maguire) rode Seabiscuit 30 times.
Seabiscuit: The unlikely champion (Fighting Furarri) who became the people's choice. "The colt's body, built low to the ground, had all the properties of a cinder block . . . blunt, coarse, rectangular, stationary," Hillenbrand wrote. "He had a sad little tail, barely long enough to brush his hocks. His stubby legs were a study in unsound construction, with huge, squarish, asymmetrical 'baseball glove' knees that didn't quite straighten out all the way, leaving him in a permanent semi-crouch."
The book took years to publish. "I did my research everywhere," Hillenbrand said. "I did, at least, 150 interviews. I looked at hundreds of record books, newspapers from the 1930s, poured over memorabilia. The research process took four years."
The film took a year to produce. I saw it with my wife on Aug. 20. It was an early afternoon matinee. We weren't disappointed - it was very entertaining and brilliantly done.
I have learned the harshest critics were professional horse people who said the movie took too much of a poetic license. Well, I guess they thought it should have been more of a documentary. No way!
The production really didn't lose much, if anything, squeezing several lifetimes, mainly six years, into 140 minutes. Frankly, the spirit of the times and the book was captured magnificently.
Obvious standouts were the actors, each portraying the main characters perfectly. Director Gary Ross, who also wrote the screenplay, did a commendable job.
However, I'd like to recognize some of the unsung heroes:
Casting director Bill Dance and associates Terri Taylor and Debra Zane: What a great job! Even the extras were a perfect fit for the 1930s.
Narrator David McCullough: You'll recognize the voice, but maybe not the name. He has done voiceovers, mainly for TV movies and specials since the early '80s. His articulate contribution complimented the presentation, especially when the scenes of the era were black-and-white.
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