The true story of a long shot race horse who became a cultural hero during the Great Depression, and of the people who believed in him.

A confluence of many superb talents on both sides of the camera with an archetypal American story about perseverance and courage, Seabiscuit is old-fashioned Hollywood filmmaking at its best, a wonderful movie-movie for an uneven summer season.

It would have been hard to screw it up. The saga of Seabiscuit and his people is so naturally compelling, Laura Hillenbrand’s book about them has been a continual bestseller from the moment it was published in 2001, an amazing true story frequently noted for its ability to make grown men cry (and we all know what tough nuts grown men are, huh?). Seabiscuit, the book, is such a darned good read, it’s tempting to wonder why no one has written it before now, but the story needed a teller of Hillenbrand’s vision, skill and wit before it became special.

By himself, Seabiscuit would be enough classic material for a whole novel: the runt offspring of a famed champion from a long line of ill-tempered winners, he was abused by his original owners, declared incorrigible, raced too often and then rejected. In his first four years of life he had grown from a good natured colt into a vicious, embittered soul who attacked the grooms and resisted all attempts at befriending him. This was the precise moment that Fate, always a better storyteller than mere mortals, brought him together with three unlikely saviors. (more…)

“The Pirate’s Code is more of a set of what you’d call ‘guidelines’ than actual rules.” — Geoffrey Rush as the double-villainous Barbossa

A curséd band of artfully tattered, mutinous rapscallions scours the Caribbean in search of a lost medallion, while their former captain is in…let’s just say, casual pursuit.

Going into the Disney-Bruckheimer Pirates of the Caribbean: And So On and So Forth, a $125 million extravaganza filled to the brim with cheeky anachronisms and some really fun visual effects, the foremost concerns on my mind were to get out of the intolerable oven of my apartment, in which I had been baking all weekend, and to see a mindless movie. As the Grail Knight of Spielberg’s Last Crusade (1989) would say, I chose…wisely. (more…)