Beware the movie that touts itself to be a sweeping epic love story. It sets up expectations of something moving, grand, and thrilling. While The Horse Whisperer was at times moving, the only thing grand about it was the Montana scenery. The love story itself was quite banal at times, and on the whole the film was a disappointment.
The story starts one snowy, winter morning, when Grace MacLean (Scarlett Johansson) and her best friend, Judith (Kate Bosworth) decide to go horseback riding. The horses slip in the snow, and slide down a hillside, landing with their riders in the path of an oncoming truck. Judith and her horse are killed, Grace loses her leg below the knee, and her horse, Pilgrim, regresses to a savage state. Grace's parents, Annie (Kristin Scott Thomas) and Robert (Sam Neill) refuse to have Pilgrim put down. Once Grace comes home from the hospital, it is clear that she is retreating, and Annie decides that the only thing to do is to retrain Pilgrim in the hopes that Grace will ride him again. She learns of a "Horse Whisperer," by the name of Tom Booker, who is known for being able to tame the most difficult of horses. Despite his unwillingness to take on Pilgrim, Annie loads Pilgrim into a trailer, and heads cross country with Grace to see Tom Booker, who is understandably less than thrilled to see them. Annie is persistent to the point of peskiness, and eventually Booker relents. As the healing process begins for both Grace and Pilgrim, Annie finds herself drawn to Booker and to the simpler life in Montana, becoming less and less interested in returning to her job as an editor in New York. And then Robert arrives to escort his wife and daughter home...
It's a promising setup, but the execution is disappointing. The story telling is very heavy handed. The pacing is slow to the point of being dull, and there is little suspense due to those two factors. The viewer has more than enough time to figure out what is going to happen, and is given a shove rather than a nudge in that direction. The ending is surprising, but only because it makes absolutely no sense.
The acting is a mixed bag. Thomas generates all the warmth of a glacier, and leaves me wondering, yet again, why any director would cast her in any role that is supposed to be likable. Redford is surprisingly stiff, and understated enough that the viewer is left wondering exactly what attracts Annie to Tom Booker, especially given Sam Neill's excellent performance as her husband. Together, Redford and Thomas generate no chemistry at all. Dianne Wiest is wonderful as always as Booker's sister-in-law Diane. And Scarlett Johansson gives a beautiful performance of a girl too young to cope with the tragedy that has befallen her. Her eventual healing is one of the few truly satisfying moments of this film.
While this is a beautifully filmed, and ultimately enjoyable movie, it certainly didn't deserve the fuss made over it. Watch it. Enjoy it. Just don't expect too much from it.
The story starts one snowy, winter morning, when Grace MacLean (Scarlett Johansson) and her best friend, Judith (Kate Bosworth) decide to go horseback riding. The horses slip in the snow, and slide down a hillside, landing with their riders in the path of an oncoming truck. Judith and her horse are killed, Grace loses her leg below the knee, and her horse, Pilgrim, regresses to a savage state. Grace's parents, Annie (Kristin Scott Thomas) and Robert (Sam Neill) refuse to have Pilgrim put down. Once Grace comes home from the hospital, it is clear that she is retreating, and Annie decides that the only thing to do is to retrain Pilgrim in the hopes that Grace will ride him again. She learns of a "Horse Whisperer," by the name of Tom Booker, who is known for being able to tame the most difficult of horses. Despite his unwillingness to take on Pilgrim, Annie loads Pilgrim into a trailer, and heads cross country with Grace to see Tom Booker, who is understandably less than thrilled to see them. Annie is persistent to the point of peskiness, and eventually Booker relents. As the healing process begins for both Grace and Pilgrim, Annie finds herself drawn to Booker and to the simpler life in Montana, becoming less and less interested in returning to her job as an editor in New York. And then Robert arrives to escort his wife and daughter home...
It's a promising setup, but the execution is disappointing. The story telling is very heavy handed. The pacing is slow to the point of being dull, and there is little suspense due to those two factors. The viewer has more than enough time to figure out what is going to happen, and is given a shove rather than a nudge in that direction. The ending is surprising, but only because it makes absolutely no sense.
The acting is a mixed bag. Thomas generates all the warmth of a glacier, and leaves me wondering, yet again, why any director would cast her in any role that is supposed to be likable. Redford is surprisingly stiff, and understated enough that the viewer is left wondering exactly what attracts Annie to Tom Booker, especially given Sam Neill's excellent performance as her husband. Together, Redford and Thomas generate no chemistry at all. Dianne Wiest is wonderful as always as Booker's sister-in-law Diane. And Scarlett Johansson gives a beautiful performance of a girl too young to cope with the tragedy that has befallen her. Her eventual healing is one of the few truly satisfying moments of this film.
While this is a beautifully filmed, and ultimately enjoyable movie, it certainly didn't deserve the fuss made over it. Watch it. Enjoy it. Just don't expect too much from it.