i saw it and thought it was pretty average as well. i think i'll write a longer review for it if i have time. people should go see starsky and hutch instead unless they don't like those type of films. in which case i guess hidalgo was okay, worth seeing.
I posted this in my other thread, but yours has a more relevant title. Let me know what you thought. Hidalgo is based on the factual historical characters of Frank T. Hopkins and his mustang Hidalgo. Viggo Mortensen, coming off his majestic role in the LOTR series, stars as the main character Hopkins, a former army dispatcher / cowboy who is famed to have won 400+ endurance races in the United States. The premise is set when the Sheik of Sheiks in Arabia (Omar Sharif) takes offense in Hidalgo's repuation as the greatest endurance horse and challenges horse and rider to his great ancestral proving ground of endurance -- the race over endless deserts called the "Ocean of Fire." Hopkins carries with him a secret burden -- he is half Sioux Indian, and he struggles mightily with his identity, destiny, and the disappearance of his race. Both he and Hidalgo as seen as perhaps fallen off their prime, so can the two friends get it together for one last triumph in the strange, distant lands of Arabia? Wait a minute. At this moment, the movie starts sounding pretty familiar. The character of Frank Hopkins has many parallels with Aragorn. Meanwhile, the movie contains MANY similar elements to Seabiscuit, and borrows (not only Sharif) heavily from the classic Lawrence of Arabia. So wow! Three awesome movies in one, this one has got to be great then right? Not exactly. Though the story of Seabiscuit and Lawrence of Arabia are great stories and told with an elegant sense of triumph and grandeur, Hidalgo rarely (never really?) reaches these heights, and though it employs many similar mechanisms, they don't all work out well. One thing I didn't particularly like was the attempt to give Hidalgo personality and add a few laughs by having the horse snort or stare at Hopkins when he makes blunders, the whole effect was a little cartoony and unnecessary (luckily they didn't do this in Seabiscuit). The two young bedouin servants of Lawrence in "Lawrence of Arabia" were well cast, taught the viewers about their culture, provided some comedic elements and all in all added a layer to the film; meanwhile the same attempt here with an old shepard assigned to serve Hopkins fails at the same goals. The twist with the evil nephew of the Sheik, Prince Atif, attempting to steal the Al Hattal, the Sheik's prized stallion and the honor of the tribe, is pretty predictable as well. The synopsis of the film boasts a "romance" with a "beautiful princess," yet Jazira, the Sheik's daughter wasn't really all that beautiful, and in any case poor chemistry with Mortensen makes the romance even more unbelievable than the pure context of it. An interesting religious/spiritual theme was laid out in the movie that was provocative for me but wasn't really 100% satisfying at the end. Throughout the movie, Hopkins' (Christian) belief of free will mixed with the can-do attitude of the wild west is set against the deterministic beliefs of the Arab Bedouins. The clash is rather compelling, as free will is related to Christianity, Hopkins' Native American culture, as well as Islam. Besides the above there were actually several other good elements to the movie. The gun-slinging, knife throwing action choreography was pretty nice. And between a couple periods of inactivity, there were some scenes that wowed me. The race scene in the beginning was nice, but the one in the end was really great, the drama of the scene exceeded, I felt, even the Seabiscuit v. War Admiral scene. The treatment of Mortensen's Native American heritage I felt was also pretty good, but I cannot judge truthfully without knowing more about it myself. One of my favorite scene, however, was when an Arab prince astride the flawless arabic stallion Al Hattal said to Hopkins: "You cannot win, I am of a race of great riders." To which Hopkins replies: "So am I." That was deep! In the end the movie yielded to too many cliches for my tastes. The underdog wins and humbles the proud Sheik, and the two become friends despite their religious differences. That was handled in a way I've seen a million times, yet one cannot really fault Omar Sharif for his dignified portrayal. Two more very common cliches are involved with the ending which I cannot reveal, but the last one made me mutter "oh c'mon!" under my breath. But all in all, there were moments in Hidalgo that were compelling and that I will remember for a while, and perhaps that is a sign of a movie worth watching. I would just watch Starsky and Hutch first. Verdict: Mixed. It won't make your day better, but it's entertainment. Date factor: both my girlfriend and I highly anticipated this movie. I was a little disappointed, and though she said she was too, I could tell she kind of liked it. Chicks dig these films. So I guess this is a positive as well.
anyone else see the special on the history channel that debunked any idea that there was even a fragment of truth to this story?
well the only peice of truth that we're supposed to accept, and that i accepted, what that Frank T. Hopkins actually existed, and was a horse rider. was even that false? in any case, yeah a lot of the script was unbelieveable. but the i don't really judge movies on believeability, and that's why i didn't have a huge problem with LXG.
i think that's right...but in a much more limited way than "horse rider" implies in this movie. nothing wrong with the story...it doesn't have to be non-fiction to be a good movie...legends are great.
yeah... it did say at the end that Frank Hopkins won over 400 races and was a proponent for wild mustang until his death. And the descendants of Hidalgo still roam free somewhere in Oklahoma. Hopefully they didn't make all that up. But at least they didn't say "based on a true story." That would have been ridiculous.
