The Black Stallion
Directed by Carroll Ballard
Written by Melissa Mattheson, Jean Rosenberg, and William D. Witliff from a novel by Walter Farley
1979/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Prime rental
Snoe: Hey, what happened to you?
Alec Ramsey: Everything.
Snoe: Everything? That’s a whole lot. It can’t be everything.
A beautifully mounted film about a boy and his horse that should appeal to all ages.
Young Alec Ramsey (Kelly Reno, 11) and his father are traveling by ship from Africa to Liverpool. Alec becomes fascinated by an untamed and fierce black Arabian stallion who is being ill-treated by some Arabs. Shortly after this, the ship sinks. Alec survives by holding onto the mane of the stallion as it swims to the shore of a desert island.
For 23 dialogue-free minutes, we see how Alec survives and watch him tame the black stallion, who is grateful after Alec frees him from some ropes.
Some fishermen pass by the island and rescue Alec. He refuses to leave without his horse and the fishermen oblige. Alec takes the Black home where it is not well-satisfied with a suburban backyard.
Eventually, the Black makes his way into the hands of an aging racehorse trainer (Mickey Rooney). So begins Alec’s dream of training the Black to be a racehorse. With Terry Garr as Alec’s mother and Clarence Muse as a philisophical horse and cart owner.
This movie is absolutely gorgeous in every way and one of the most baffling omissions in Oscar history was the failure of cinematographer Caleb Deschanel to earn an Oscar nomination. The other amazing features are the talent of Cass-Olé the horse and Kelly Reno who did most of the riding himself. The movie has a kind of pleasing fairy tale quality that I really enjoyed.
Studio executives delayed the release of this film for two years. They said “What is this? An art film for children?”. The film won a Special Achievement Oscar for Sound Editing. Mickey Rooney got a well-deserved nomination for Best Supporting Actor. The film was also nominated for film editing. I would have given it nods for the cinematography and for Carmine Coppola’s evocative score.
