Black Beauty *** (1994, Sean Bean, David Thewlis, Jim Carter, Peter Davison, Alun Armstrong, Peter McEnery, Eleanor Bron, Peter Cook) – Classic Movie Review 11,818

Writer-director Caroline Thompson’s 1994 film Black Beauty is a good-looking, lavish and entertaining version of the beloved Anna Sewell children’s yarn about a farmer who makes friends with a magnificent black colt. It stars Sean Bean, David Thewlis, Jim Carter, Peter Davison, Alun Armstrong and Peter McEnery. Andrew Knott plays the young Joe Green and Ian Kelsey plays the older Joe Green.

The film’s success is spearheaded with engaging acting, a nice horse and expert backstage work, especially the music (Danny Elfman) and cinematography (Alex Thomson). It is a careful, lovingly crafted British heritage outing, with Eleanor Bron and Peter Cook having fun as aristocrats, Lord and Lady of Wexmire.

Bizarrely, in a 1990s take on the story, it is treated as an autobiography of the horse Black Beauty as in the original novel, and the horse Black Beauty narrates the tale this time, with Alan Cumming’s voice. The black American Quarter Horse Docs Keepin Time is the Black Beauty horse.

The fifth cinema adaptation of Anna Sewell’s 1877 novel, it is produced and distributed by Warner Bros Family Entertainment.

Surprisingly, there were fairly churlish reviews, and public indifference, and it performed poorly at the box office and made a loss, grossing only $4,630,377 in the US.

Writer-debut director Thompson wrote the screenplay for the 1993 The Secret Garden.

It is followed by Black Beauty (2020).

Cinema films of the novel: Black Beauty (1907), Black Beauty (1921), Black Beauty (1933), Black Beauty (1946), Black Beauty (1971), Black Beauty (1978), Black Beauty (1987), Black Beauty (1994), and Black Beauty (2020).

The cast are Andrew Knott as Joe Green, Ian Kelsey as older Joe Green, Sean Bean as Farmer Grey, David Thewlis as Jerry Barker, Jim Carter as John Manly, Peter Davison as Squire Gordon, Alun Armstrong as Reuben Smith, John McEnery as Mr. York, Eleanor Bron as Lady Wexmire, Peter Cook as Lord Wexmire, Keeley Flanders as Dolly Barker, Niall O’Brien as Farmer Thoroughgood and Alan Cumming as Black Beauty (voice).

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,818

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