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Why are girls so obsessed with horses? Is it because of the all-too-obvious sexual connection of straddling a powerful, beautiful animal and riding it until weary and satisfied? Or is it because horses are pretty, with lovely ponytails and manes? Is it because horses represent freedom for the owner while giving that owner their allegiance? Or is it because horses are mysterious creatures that somehow "know" us on a physical and spiritual level? Writer Nicholas Evans thinks all of the above and then some. His novel The Horse Whisperer, a fluffy work of self-help spiritualism, was widely successful because it addressed the girlish preoccupation with horses and rendered it a sacred allegory for how humans come to terms with their "centers." Though plenty of men read Evans' book, the novel tapped into the girl hiding inside many grown women: the horse worshiper. Or the novel worshiper. As popular novels are now more like wordy screenplays than unadaptable works of literature, it is no wonder that Evans' book quickly made it to the big screen. The shift is not necessarily bad. Many film versions of novels are vast improvements--see The Bridges of Madison County. The adaptation of The Horse Whisperer is an improvement, but it isn't great. Directed by and starring Robert Redford, The Horse Whisperer tells a story of trauma and renewal. While riding her horse in icy upstate New York, 14-year-old Grace MacLean (Scarlett Johansson) experiences a life-shattering tragedy: She and her best friend are hit by a truck after their horses lose footing in the ice. The friend dies. Grace survives, but her leg has to be removed, and her horse, Pilgrim, is wounded. Grace's mother and father--Annie (Kristin Scott Thomas), a shrewd, controlling magazine editor, and Robert (Sam Neill), a kindly lawyer--search for a way to alleviate their daughter's understandable depression. Pilgrim has become deranged and dangerous, but after looking into its eyes, Annie cannot bear to put the horse down. She reads about a man with a special gift for horses and packs Grace and herself off to Montana to meet him. Tom Booker (Redford) is a rugged individualist, a rancher who lives with his brother's family. At first he resists Annie's request to cure Pilgrim, but he's won over by the situation and her tenacity. In the process, he revitalis Grace's and Annie's tattered souls. The sentimental-drivel factor is high, and there are many unbearable moments: The ranch family led by Chris Cooper and Dianne Wiest are so strongly characterized as good, honest people who eat big, hearty meals and teach their children country manners that they become nauseating. How many times do we have to watch these people eat? Similarly, the perfection of Redford's character is ridiculous: He is intelligent, college-educated, rugged, handsome, gifted, spiritual, humble, lovelorn, virile, and attracted to plain-Jane Annie. Please. Kristin Scott Thomas is a fine actress, but she lacks the sexual chemistry with Redford to make viewers desperately want them together. The nerve-wracking power of unobtainable lust that was so well displayed by Daniel Day-Lewis and Michelle Pfeiffer in The Age of Innocence is woefully missing from this film, due mostly to the miscasting of Thomas (come to think of it, Pfeiffer would have been perfect as Annie). Redford, however, is appealing, and he gives his simplistic character dimension as well as leathery sex appeal. The best scenes involve Redford and Pilgrim working out their demons in beautifully filmed and fascinating sequences. They make us believe in the connection between horse and man. We don't believe as much in the connection between girl and horse, an important element of the movie. Representing the connection that people make when they let their skittish guards down and yield to the comforting power of a "whisperer," the horse here symbolizes women, while the nurturer is the man. If the man learns to understand what makes the fragile being tick, then a deeper bond can be built with the woman or horse, and happiness will prevail. But only if you meet "those among men who see into a creature's soul and soothe the wounds they find there," as the film tells us. And only if you can get past this movie's sap, which is harder than soothing souls through "secrets uttered softly into troubled ears." |
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