Milkduds

Hidalgo (7/10)

May 26th, 2005

Once again, I can tell that I am a sucker for great cinematography and, now I find out, epic soundtracks. Hidalgo isn’t an excellent movie overall, but those two things and the addition of pretty good acting, make it a fairly good and entertaining movie to watch. The movie follows the real life inspired character of Frank T. Hopkins (played by Viggo Mortensen) as he attempts to win a 1,000 year-old race across the Arabian desert with his American mustang.

There really are some spectacular shots of American landscape, Civil War sets, but mostly desert landscapes. The people that take these shots seem to be so few and far between, that I can’t help but acknowledge them when I see work like this. The soundtrack and score on this movie was also very moving and helped with the scenes, both slow and fast. The film, as far as story and screenplay goes, was a well-defined epic tale but had some seriously corny moments. Mortensen does an decent job with a southern accent, but his acting was great. Omar Sharif, who you might remember best from Dr Zhivago (another awesome epic), plays the owner of the best Arabian horse that is expected to win, and does a fine job as well. This isn’t a short movie at 2:15, but if you like good cinematography, enjoy epic stories, and can deal with some corn, then you’ll appreciate this movie.

Entry Filed under: Movies