Last year two coming-of-age films were released that dealt with the power of storytelling and the bonds of family. Both films were helmed by geek heroes. Both boasted an impressive cast of veteran actors and talented newcomers. Both used amazing fantasy sequences as analogies for deeper conflicts. And both were darn fine movies.

The difference, of course is that while Tim Burton's admittedly great Big Fish earned plenty of accolades and landed on quite a few "Best of 2003" lists, writer/director Tim McCanlies' terrific Secondhand Lions was all but ignored. The film was dismissed by critics as pandering and melodramatic, and derided by most of the online film community as a slight, insubstantial kiddie flick.

It's time to set things straight.

The Flick

A battered old biplane soars and swoops through the clouds. The plane stutters in the air, then blasts down low above the highway, tearing beneath a bridge and frightening the daylights out of a state trooper. Inside the plane are two ninety-year-old men, laughing and hooting like maniacs. The plane climbs back into the sky and disappears into the sun. It's a great scene, funny and strangely poetic at the same time, and it sets the tone for the rest of Secondhand Lions.

Soon after we meet Walter (Haley Joel Osment ), a young boy who is being sent to live with his two reclusive uncles on their rural Texas farm. Walter's mother (Kyra Sedgwick) is a bit of a flake, a shallow and materialistic creature who needs to get rid of Walter so she can go party in Las Vegas. But she also has an ulterior motive for leaving Walter behind, because his uncles are hiding a secret. As teenagers they disappeared from the country for almost forty years, and they somehow returned as millionaires. With a distinct lack of shame, she explains to Walter that his uncles will die sooner or later, and that somebody will need to inherit their fortune.

When we first meet Garth and Hub McCann, they're standing knee-deep in a dirty pond, blasting catfish with shotguns. They're not happy to see Walter, but they reluctantly agree to watch "the sissy boy" until his mother can straighten her life out a bit.

It's baffling to me how this movie seemed to be dismissed as a film for children. The McCann brothers are played by Michael Caine and Robert Duvall, who aren't simply great actors--they're two of the greatest actors of all time. I would pay to watch either Caine or Duvall clean a bathroom, and seeing them together onscreen again is an absolute blast. Duvall's Hub is a cantankerous old custard, a snarling, surly man who can't accept the fact that he has grown old. Caine's Garth is quieter and more intellectual, but he ably holds his own against Hub's larger-than-life actions. The actors have great chemistry together, and they help elevate the material into something special.

Despite their rumored wealth, the brothers live in a beaten-down old farmhouse overrun by mangy dogs and an excitable pig. To Walter's horror, he quickly learns that there is no telephone or television to be found. Instead the brothers pass their time waiting for traveling salesmen to arrive, at which point they grab their shotguns and terrorize the salesmen off their property.

"We don't know nothing about raising kids," Walter is told on his first night. "And we're old. So if we kick off during the night, you're on your own." With this half-serious warning, he's sent to his room, a dusty old attic filled with exotic mementos from faraway lands. It is here where Walter finds a hidden treasure chest filled with golden sand and the faded photograph of a beautiful woman.

The mystery deepens when he finds Hub sleepwalking one night by the edge of the pond. The old man is carrying a toilet plunger, and he fights wildly, stabbing unseen foes and beating the surface of the lake into a froth.

Eventually Walter begins to piece together the story from Garth. Apparently the brothers were shanghaied into the French Foreign Legion and forced to fight deep in the heart of Africa. During this time period, Hub fell in love with a mysterious princess engaged to marry a dangerous sheik. The sheik swore revenge on Hub, triggering a chain of events that led to the brother's fortune.

It's an engaging story told entirely in flashbacks (Angel fans take note--the younger Hub is played by Christian Kane, tattooed maniac lawyer Lindsey in the Whedonverse.). While the fantasy segments in Big Fish opted for jaw-dropping spectacle and surrealism, director McCanlies stages these segments through the eyes of a child, creating a stylized world that is bursting with color and torn directly from the Technicolor adventure serials of the 1950s. In a sense these stories are a loving homage to the swashbuckling genre (including a very nice Indiana Jones reference), and if they're not as artistic as some of the stories in Big Fish, they're easily twice as much fun.

But are they true? That's the question Walter wrestles with. Did the brothers steal their gold from a despotic sultan, or were they notorious bank robbers in the 1930s? Nobody seems to know the truth except for Hub and Garth themselves.

And that’s just the first half of the film. The second half involves skeet shooting, a lion that lives in a cornfield, the funniest fistfight of the year, and so much more.

Writer/director Tim McCanlies brings a lot of talent to the table. This is the man who wrote The Iron Giant, after all, which is merely the greatest 2-D animated film of the last two decades. His keen ear for dialogue and his ability to write emotional scenes with a minimum of sentimentality are on full display here. While his work behind the camera might not be overtly stylish, he’s got a good eye for highlighting wonderful little character moments, from Garth’s expression after Hub catches him telling stories to Osment’s violent reaction to a mouthful of chewing tobacco. But the screenplay is the star here…it’s sharp, insightful, and tremendously funny.

One criticism that has been leveled at this film is that it’s slight, an insubstantial little nothing of a movie. I couldn’t disagree more. This is a film that deals with a man wrestling with his own mortality, a brother trying to hold his family together, a mother learning responsibility for the first time, and a boy slowly becoming a man. The fact that all of this is accomplished with a generous helping of humor and a family-friendly PG rating has somehow stigmatized Secondhand Lions as a kid’s film. Don’t believe the lies. This is a FILM, pure and simple, and the fact that it’s enjoyable for all ages is simply a testament to McCanlies’ skill as a writer and director.

For one thing, you won’t see better chemistry between actors in any film from last year than Caine and Duvall. The old thespians take roles that could have easily become redneck clichés and infuse them with wit, elegance and humanity. They’re absolutely iconic here, and I’ve never enjoyed either actor more.

Haley Joel Osment received a critical drubbing for his role here, but again I strongly disagree. Many reviewers mocked Osment for his awkward, self-conscious performance, completely missing the point that his character is meant to be awkward and self-conscious. I normally try to avoid letting supplemental DVD material influence my opinion, but the commentary and acting featurettes on this disc clearly explain how all of Osment’s “mistakes” as an actor were deliberate choices. Walter is a timid and uncoordinated kid on the verge of puberty, frightened and badly out of his element. His transformation into a confident and assertive young man is handled remarkably well, and while he can’t always hold his own against Caine and Duvall, it’s not for lack of trying. Let’s face it…Osment is easily the best child actor in recent memory, and his work here is perfectly suited to the material.

The film only stumbles in the final reel. Similar to Big Fish, the director tacks on an unnecessary epilogue that conclusively answers whether or not Garth’s fantastic stories were true. I would have preferred a more ambiguous ending, and the entire segment strains credibility just a tad. It’s not a fatal mistake, but when the rest of the film is this darn good, any and all flaws become more apparent.

Secondhand Lions isn’t the best film ever made…far from it. And it’s not even the best film of last year. But it *is* a great film, full of heart, imagination and wonder. After my first viewing I liked it quite a bit. Now, after seeing the film three times, I think I love it. It’s one of the best surprises of 2003.

8.8 out of 10

The Look

This is a weird transfer. Parts of this film look absolutely gorgeous, while other parts are just a gigantic mess. I've read reports that Miramax did a lot of tinkering with this film, and the wildly varying film stock supports this. Particularly bad are the black levels, which are so murky and washed out that it becomes impossible to tell what's happening. More than one scene is ruined by heavy shadows.

8.5 out of 10

The Noise

Again, an excellent job. Patrick Doyle's wonderful score comes through crystal clear, the dialogue comes through great, and there's really nothing to quibble about. For the record, it's presented in Dolby 5.1.

8.5 out of 10

The Goodies

Here's another reason why I love New Line. The supplemental material isn't much, but it's ALL worthwhile. Short of The Lord of the Rings movies, when was the last time you could say that about a DVD? Best of all, for a movie that was regarded as a "kiddie flick," we're spared the typical point-and-click interactive game nonsense. This material is geared toward film fans, and I love 'em for that.

First off we get a commentary track from Tim McCanlies. It's a good listen, despite the fact that sometimes he starts describing the scene itself. But the guy talks fast, he presents a ton of information, and the track is often funny. One of the better commentaries I've heard recently.

On disc two we find three featurettes. The first is One Screenplay's Wild Ride in Hollywood, and it's GREAT. Apparently the script bounced around Tinseltown for almost a decade before it was finally made, and this thirty minute documentary shows you exactly how it happened. If you've ever been curious how scripts get picked up by producers, attach stars to the property, and finally receive the greenlight, you'll dig this. I found the entire thing fascinating, and it's really the type of feature that should be included on more DVDs.

(Random tidbit: The script first landed at Warner Brothers, who decided that it should be rewritten as a sequel to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. After that deal fortunately fell through, the producers wanted to rewrite it for Lemmon and Matthau as Grumpy Old Men 3. How weird is that?)

A second featurette is "On the Set of Secondhand Lions," also around thirty minutes. It sounds like typical PR fluff, but it takes a more interesting path by focusing on the smaller details of the film's shoot. We see the production designers tear apart a nice country home to turn it into the McCann's decrepit home. There's a section on the animals, demonstrating how they would train their pigs to hit a certain mark, or how the dogs gradually wormed themselves into more and more of the script. There's a cool bit where they explain how the animatronic lion worked, and it's capped by a great bit of behind-the-scenes footage of the celebration that took place after the three lead actors finished their final scene. This is how these documentaries should be done.

"Haley Joel Osment: An Actor Comes of Age" sounds excruciating, but once again, the feature surprises. It’s simply a fifteen minute conversation with Osment as he talks about the experience of being a child actor, his approach to choosing screenplays, and the difficulties of going through puberty on a movie set. Nothing life-changing, but it’s a fun feature.

Finally, there are almost forty minutes of deleted and alternate scenes, complete with director’s commentary. A number of them are fantasy segments--some good, some bad--but there are two great scenes that I wish would have been included in the final cut. The first is a funny bit where the characters figure out a new way to dispose of their corn crop (it involves shotguns), while the second is a great little character moment that explains exactly why the salesmen keep visiting their house. On the other side of the spectrum is the jaw-droppingly bad original ending, which would have been enough to kill the movie dead for practically everybody in the audience. It’s simply horrible.

Two visual effects comparisons highlight the CGI work, and a handful of trailers, TV spots and Easter Eggs round out the package. On the whole, it’s not a ton of material, but it’s really good material. Nicely done, New Line.

9.0 out of 10

The Artwork

Eh. It’s the theatrical poster. The lion’s tail in the foreground and the giraffe in the distance play up the fantasy elements, but I could have done without the dumb-assed Gene Shalit quote or the “Film Advisory Board Award of Excellence” emblem.

7.0 out of 10

 

THE FLICK: 8.8 THE LOOK: 8.5 THE NOISE: 8.5 THE GOODIES: 9.0 THE ARTWORK: 7.0

OVERALL: 8.8

Be sure to read the excellent original review .