Great book! Great Cast! Great Special Effects! Great Horse! Great Movie!

Rating: 9/10 (9 August 2003)

I was born in 1926, 7 years before Seabiscuit was foaled in 1933.
In the mid -30's and early 40's my Father took me to the Races at
Bing Crosby's Del Mar Race Track near San Diego. I might have
seen the wonderful little runt, but I don't remember. I read Laura
Hillenbarnd''s book in 2001 - what a surprising literary work of art
and love! EBay provided me with very fine people selling very good
Seabiscuit products of every type. I became a small collector - my
greatest purchase, a gift from a great eBay seller of a photo of a
Xmas card from the C.S. Howard family showing Seabiscuit with
his 7 little "Biscuits"- his first babies (weanlings). I also finally won a bid for the original COME ON SEABISCUIT
book by Ralph Moody, a teen agers' book but great for me, too, and
I'm now 77. -----I went to the movie on the first day, July 25, in my
hometown, Ann Arbor, Michigan. A lot of seniors had the same
idea.---- It is a fabulous movie - the love that the 3 (4 if you count
jockey George Wolff beautifully played by a real jockey) main
characters feel for the horse and its ups and downs, many of them
serious downs, comes through the screen right into your heart. C.S. Howard's wife Marcella(Elizabeth Banks) is the 5th lover of
Seabiscuit. and a convincing loving wife and lover of Seabiscuit.
The little horse meant so much to our country in a sad depressed
time, and now in the middle of sad wars, we have a reason to fall
in love again with the inspiring horse. If you don't cheer during the
Match Race with War Admiral, you are not really an anmal lover.
Wm T.Macey is no Clem McCarthy, but he is so funny as a
commentator that for a few minutes we can relax with the
diversion, then back to the high drama. Seabiscuit died young at
age l4 in 1947 at the beloved ranch of his owner C.S. Howard
having received enough love to almost make up for the early
abuses the little horse suffered. C.S. Howard is played with gusto
by Jeff Bridges. Tom Smith, the original horse-whisperer is
academy award material played by Chris Cooper., Tobey McGuire
as jockey Pollard is very good, better than in "Spiderman" and
Marcella Howard (played by Elizabeth Banks) is terrific. I would
have preferred a shorter depression story at the beginning, less
telescoping later, and the inclusion of jockey Red Pollard's
romance and marriage to his nurse. I would have liked closing
notes on the deaths and later lives of everyone in writing at the end
of the movie. Nevertheless, it is a solid 9. Racing sequences are
a solid 10.