SEABISCUIT

All I ever knew about Seabiscuit, I got from "The Story of Seabiscuit," a Shirley Temple movie I saw on a black and white TV screen way back when. I didn’t know it then but I also got to see the real Seabiscuit do his stuff in the stock footage used for the movie. Seabiscuit, seen at distance equal to the diameter of the track, looked like any other horse in a field of horses. At the time theater newsreel cameramen were covering his races, people used radio to do what TV does today. It brought dramas, comedies, serials, music, and sports events into their homes. Words pouring through the airwaves were like colors on a palette that helped people form pictures with their imagination. In "Seabiscuit," adapted from Laura Hildebrand’s fact based Depression era best seller, a fictitious radio announcer, played with inventive glee by William H. Macy, is used like a Greek chorus to bridge the gaps in the lives of the owner, trainer and jockey who made history with a horse that never defied the image of a thoroughbred: Charles Howard, an auto entrepreneur turned horse owner; Tom Smith , the one time horse wrangler who is more at home with horses than real people; and Red Pollard, a Shakespeare spouting rider who never knows when to duck in a brawl.

At first "Seabiscuit" moves with the pace of a European art film. It dwells on the triumphs and tragedies that mold the men’s characters and explores the confluence of historical events that brings them together. Charles Howard (Jeff Bridges) is a self styled promoter who goes from fixing bikes to selling Stanley Steamers. He He builds himself a mini auto empire and becomes a man of influence. A horse farm becomes a stable for his cars until cars are longer affordable. Tragedy cannot dampen his inquisitiveness even though it clouds everything else around him. With the onset of the Great Depression, Howard channels his energy to horse breeding and he wiles his time away at the track. Red Pollard (Tobey Maguire), so named because of his mane of red hair, is raised on horses. Left penniless his father and mother force him to strike out on his own. His second love, literature, helps him get through the tough times. He acts out his favorite stories to camp side audiences. His success at back lot racing helps him break through to the pros but he short changes his talent with booze and a short fuse. One brawl too many keeps him from making the big time. Red hoboes from one ranch to another until he finds himself at Howard’s ranch. Tom Smith (Chris Cooper) is a weathered horse whisperer who communes with nature by living off the land and sleeping under the stars. Like many a horse he has been put out to pasture, his skills no longer recognized. He takes odd jobs where he can find them, cowboying here, and pitching hay there. He stumbles upon a horse ready to meet its maker. Smith identifies with something he sees in the horse. In his eyes, the horse - like himself - has not outlived his usefulness. Smith also sees obstinacy:- an unwillingness to become a workhorse like his stable mates; endurance - the ability to survive one humiliation after another; and courage - the willingness to trust someone who will return that trust and allow him to do what he was born to do - run like hell. The horse’s name is Seabiscuit.

Smith nurses Seabiscuit back to health, piquing Howard’s interest and Pollard’s enthusiasm. Red too will have a chance to do what he was born to do. It’s a trifecta. A three way love affair. Seabiscuit has heart’ they say. Jeff Bridges reanimates Howard’s promotional skills. A renewed zest for life replaces grief. Cooper takes Smith out of the doldrums and puts him in the zone. And Tobey Maguire puts the fight back in Pollard where it belongs: on the back of a horse. Three people and a horse are joined together in a common bond. Their combined strengths form a near perfect union of hearts and minds that allows them to rise above the crowd and beat the odds that life has stacked against them. Their story inspired a nation and forced the owner of Rear Admiral, triple crown winner, to succumb to the baiting of Charles Howard and bend to the will of the people by agreeing to a match race. And even though you know the outcome, the writing, the acting, and direction lead you through the big build up as if the race were happening for the first time. I found myself rooting for Seabiscuit as if I were at the track. Then the camera cuts away from the race in a move that some found annoying but which I found brilliant. You’re taken into the homes and work places of America to hear the race of the century on the radio the way millions of Americans heard it that day. I was as caught up in the fever of the moment as much as anyone else on the screen whose ears were glued to the voice box that brought the news of the world to the nation. It was a victory for the media and Seabiscuit. It showed the power of radio and the hope that the victory of an underdog held for a country where being an underdog had become a way of life for most Americans. I left one part out that is best left for a viewer to discover for himself. Still there is more to the story than just one match race. Later a mishap cripples horse and man. In true heroic tradition both rise above the odds one last time to turn tragedy into triumph.

Sometimes truth can be more wondrous than fiction. Writer/director Gary Ross has brought that truth to life thanks to a pool of talent that included, not only a great cast, but a magnificent camera crew that caught every sinewy muscle of the professional jockeys and horses moving in unison. "Seabiscuit" is a thrilling movie from beginning to end. It has action, romance, and enough passion for two movies. But most of all, like the real life Seabiscuit, it has heart - in spades.

Copyright 2003

"The Story of Seabiscuit" (1948) - Admittedly not up to par with the new "Seabiscuit" but it’s worth a look to see the color stock footage of the real Seabiscuit in action. Shirley Temple is the fictitious daughter of cantankerous trainer Barry Fitzgerald who falls in love with Seabiscuit’s jockey, played by Lon McAllister. Pure Hollywood schmaltz but the horse stuff is pretty accurate.

"Pleasantville" (1998) - Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon enter the world of a fictitious TV sitcom, not unlike "Father Knows Best," and upset the make believe world of homespun values with their more realistic approach to life. Love and passion turn black and white people into colorful characters in more ways than one.

Two hits written by Gary Ross

"Dave" (1993) - Ross probably drew on his experience in government as a speech writer for President Bill Clinton to come up with this fantasy about a man hired to impersonate the President when he is taken ill. Kevin Kline plays both and Sigourney Weaver plays the wife who lies the new and improved President better than the real one. The politics may be closer to modern times but the idea of impersonating a head of state has been before in "The Prisoner of Zenda" as a couple of silents and then again more famously in 1937 and 1952.

"Big" (1998) - Tom Hanks plays a child in a man’s body thanks to a fortune telling machine that grants him a wish.

"Tucker: The Man and his Dreams" (1988) - One of director Francis Ford Coppola’s best. Jeff Bridges plays Preston Tucker in this true story about the maker of a dream car who had to be stopped before he has a chance to upstage the auto industry of his time.