Directed by Steven Spielberg, I would normally have looked this up before but the wife saw it at the cinema and had such a tearful experience that she didn’t want to watch it again. Still that’s what man caves and lock downs are for.
The film opens with a horse being born. Can’t fault them for missing bits out. The horse is sold to a pissed up Peter Mullan at market who has no business buying a thoroughbred at market, apart from noising up his landlord, David Thewlis. Thewlis is made out to be a bit of a dick for wanting his rent off the permanently pissed Mullan, but you can hardly blame him. Mullan’s son Albert takes charge of the horse which he calls Joey.
Joey manages to plough a rocky field against all odds giving the locals their best entertainment in years. ‘Love Island’ was still a madman’s dream. Despite its great work with plough, Mullen sells the nag to Loki when his turnip crop fails. Loki is the nicest man in the army who needs horses for the recently started first world war. He promises to keep in touch with Albert but that plan fizzles out when his and Dr Strange’s battle plan turns out to be a load of dated bollocks.
Joey then falls into the hands of the Hun but luckily it’s the nice Germans that we rarely see on film. After a short period of ownership the German owners get shot as deserters and the horse takes up boarding with an old French man and his granddaughter. After a two minute ride the horse gets captured again by the Germans and is tasked with pulling artillery. With its luck it must have done a dump on a leprechaun.
Meanwhile Albert has enlisted in the army and has a date at the Somme. Can the man and horse be reunited to live happily ever after?
This is a quality film with some cracking sequences and star names popping up at every turn. The scenes on the Somme were fantastic, especially when Joey loses a fight with some barbed wire. Once again the Germans turn out to be nice and that’s the pervading feel of the film. Everyone is decent really - surprised that they managed to start a war!
The horse itself doesn’t have much in the way of character but it’s used as a cipher to show the various theatres of war and the consequences of it. There was plenty of gruesome deaths and the trenches were well realised. The various vignettes showing the horse’s different owners were a good device for speeding the plot along and to keep us engaged. I don’t think I was ever that taken with the horse, which looked largely disinterested throughout, but the human interest angles were well done and it would be a man of stone who wouldn’t shed a tear at the sepia toned, sunset finale.
It is a bit long at 140 minutes but there is a lot packed in and practically every British character actor you can think of - I liked Eddie Marsan’s tough as nails but nice really sergeant and Davos Seaworth’s kill ‘em no cure ‘em doctor.
Overall this is an impressive and emotional ride on an old nag that they couldn’t put down.
Best Bit : The Major put in £10 - sob! ‘W’ Rating 19/23
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