where: CENTURY 14 VALLEJO in Vallejo, CA
when: Sunday, October 17th, 2010
show: 1:00 p.m. ( Dollar-Off First Show Matinee )
costs: $6.25
auditorium: 1
seat: 4th row, 8ht column
synopsis: A housewife, Penny Chenery Tweedy ( Diane Lane ), finds herself in charge of her ill father's horse stables. But, despite her lack of experience, she helps to raise and train a horse which is destined to become a legend, Secretariat, the greatest horse in horse racing history.
noteworthy scenes: 1.) The 'phone call; 2.) Childhood memories; 3.) Mother's pin; 4.) "I'm a professor, you're a housewife"; 5.) Fraud; 6.) Superfly; 7.) "Fore"; 8.) Record book; 9.) Coin toss; 10.) "You've done four"; 11.) "It's just beginning"; 12.) "How much did you spend on that hat"; 13.) "If there's a price, how's it freedom, Dad"; 14.) "Do you like my hat'; 15.) School play; 16.) "I'll be ready. Why wouldn't I be"; 17.) First win; 18.) "Horse loves the attention"; 19.) Trophies; 20.) Dance; 21.) "Seven wins in four months"; 22.) Horse of the Year; 23.) Hospital; 24.) Tax issues; 25.) Select opportunity; 26.) No's; 27.) "They call you tiny"; 28.) The Triple Crown; 29.) Newspaper article; 30.) "Good evening, K-Mart shoppers"; 31.) Grandest words; 32.) "One loss can happen, two is non-performance"; 33.) Abscess; 34.) The stare-down; 35.) "Can I have a moment with him"; 36.) Get ready; 37.) Fastest Derby ever; 38.) The Preakness Stakes win; 39.) "Belmont is the graveyard of speed horses"; 40.) "He knows ..."; 41.) "Second fastest ever"; 42.) "He'll be wearing wings"; 43.) The coin; 44.) Newspaper clippings; 45.) "I've ran my race, now you run yours"; 46.) "He knows what's going on"; 47.) "Don't burst his heart"; 48.) "I got a tip on a horse"; 49.) Too fast; 50.) "Let him run"; 51.) Thirty-one lengths; and 52.) Picture series during the Ending Credits.
prediction: Diane Lane will win an Oscar.
audience reaction: The audience, and there were many who turned up for this show, liked this "Feel Good" Sports Docudrama. Some of them even clapped their hands in each scene wherein Secretariat won the race.
recommendation: I enjoyed this movie, too. Go see it.
spoiler alert! The movie starts in 1969 when Penny received the news about her mother's death. When she arrived at the family's stables, her ill father, Christopher Chenery ( Scott Glenn ), was there. Wrong. Her father was committed to a hospital the year before and stayed there for about five years until his death in 1973 ( the main reason why the family-run business was losing money ). The movie shows only one sibling, a brother, when, in actuality, she had other siblings. The mark on the forehead and snout of the horse that played the part of Secretariat, a white star with a blaze extending toward the tip of the snout, kept changing in sharpness, in shape and in length; and in one scene the blaze looked like it was drawn with a chalk and a ruler's edge. Bull Hancock ( Fred Dalton Thompson ) advised Penny to hire Roger Laurin to run the stables and train the horses, which Roger ( Lucien's son ) did until he received a better job offer from Ogden Phipps ( James Cromwell ). And it was only then that she hired Lucien Laurin ( John Malkovich ). The Belmont Stakes is not the infamous "graveyard of the favored to win." That honor belongs to the Whitney Stakes were Secretariat lost after his Triple Crown win. There was an indoor scene later on where in the background, on top of a mantle, shelf or wooden file drawer, you could see a statuette of a greyhound dog; I don't know about you, but this struck me as an oddity since the movie is not about race-dogs but about racehorses. One of the news photographers at the press conference didn't have a flashbulb attached to his camera when everybody else did. I wouldn't have noticed it except that the idiot was in front, clicking away with his camera.
fyi: The fuzzy TV reception sure brought back memories. Ah, the "good" old days .... NOT!!!
I wonder if Secretariat is the inspiration for the Big Red chewing gum.
I had a co-worker, a lovely, wonderful woman, who passed away approximately a year ago. She would have loved this movie.
I wanted to see this movie in Walnut Creek, California, tomorrow, because that is where I saw 2003's SEABISCUIT, another legendary racehorse from the late 30s. But I couldn't wait any longer.
Interestingly, Seabiscuit was originally owned by the Phipps family who once owned the Claiborne Farm which was later sold to Bull Hancock.
Back in Matina, Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines, the name of Secretariat became familiar to me because it was almost always listed in the sports section of the newspaper. I don't follow horse racing, but there are a lot of horse racing fans in the Philippines, too.
Secretariat was buried in Claiborne Farm, and is probably the only racehorse buried whole. Traditionally, only the head, heart and hooves of a winning racehorse are buried; the rest of its body is cremated.
The Bible quote about a war horse racing off to battle is from the Old Testament's Book of Job 39: 19 - 25.
word of advice: Go for it.
tidbits: It's official: Non-fertilized eggs kept refrigerated can still be fresh enough to eat after 112 days! ( Refer back to my tidbits on WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS. ) I just ate one--of the last two that I boiled--at 12:40 a.m. today. What a way to start my day!
At around 10:00 a.m., I had a craving for Chicharon. So, I made a quick trip to Vargas Market, a Mexican store, on Sonoma Boulevard to get some. But the pieces that the butcher selected for me were hard and not crunchy enough. In other words, they were not prepared and cooked properly. What a waste of $8.80!
Tomorrow, I'll be sure to buy the much better Philippine-style Chicharon at Selecta Filipino Buffet on Springs Road.
As I sat to watch the Ending Credits scroll down, some man walking out with the crowd touched the top of my head with his bulk candy bag--and didn't apologize for it. How rude! 'Remember what I said about the Vallejo crowd ...? Well, here's another clear example of it.
After the movie, I swung by the Dollar Tree Store in the Target Shopping Center and bought a bag of Cat Food, a pack of Fudge Grahams, and a box of Devil's Food Cremes.
After the movie, I swung by the Dollar Tree Store in the Target Shopping Center and bought a bag of Cat Food, a pack of Fudge Grahams, and a box of Devil's Food Cremes.
