20/20 Filmsight - Film Criticism by David O'Connell

Buck Brannaman is the kind of unassuming guy you might consider too bland or benign to warrant a feature length documentary. Initial assumptions couldn’t be more false, for in Cindy Meehl’s warm, endearing portrait of this laid-back character we’re allowed a glimpse beyond the home-spun wisdom and iconic potential to understand what inspired Nicholas Evans’s book The Horse Whisperer and the subsequent 1998 Robert Redford film that adapted it.

There are two striking aspects about Buck’s life. Firstly, the degree of sacrifice he has long made in leaving his wife and daughter behind for 9 months of each year to drive solo around America to conduct clinics in which he treats and offers sage advice about dealing with troubled horses. Then there’s the back story of his formative years spent under the cruel hand of a vindictive, abusive alcoholic father and his moral resusitation via step-parents with very different child-rearing sensibilities.

Rather than repeat the cycle of violence established by his father, Buck has always maintained a fierce determination to fall on the opposite side of the fence; in continuing his mission he has more than sufficiently negated, and finally, eroded the dark malignant shadow cast by his supposed protector; his clinics highlight both acts of altruism and a kind of valuable community service.

There are no magical transformations on screen here; it’s the subtlety of Buck’s approach that defines a mysterious healing component, a rapport with these animals earned only over time and familiarity with their complex natures. One particularly troubled equine provides a moment of violence, attacking Buck’s consoling offsider. The truth, for the horse’s owner, when frankly acknowledged by Buck, is a little much to bear and it’s in this raw moment of confrontating a painful truth that the meaningful but occasionally over-generous communion between horse and owner is made clear.

Buck Brannaman is a man very much deserving his own feature length documentary. And Meehl, adapting a laconic, understated style, has done his story justice, allowing Buck to ponder his own influences and motivation. In so doing we’re allowed to spend a judicious amount of time with an eminently likable man, and one whose story serves as a humble but inspirational reminder of the intrinsic goodness we’re all capable of.



I say: An amiable portrait of an inspirational man who has overcome the odds to become an gently iconic figure to those with a specific need.

See it for: Simply, Buck himself. A story and man with a heart as big as Phar Lap.