War Horse: An Illustrated Review.

January 10, 2012 5:24 AM

War Horse: An Illustrated Review Lisa Hanawalt really likes horses and drawing horses and being a horse and films about horses, and so has drawn an illustrated review of the new film version of War Horse. [SPOILER WARNING FOR BOTH LINKS] [Via Glinner]
posted by EndsOfInvention (40 comments total)

This whole thing is hilarious and I just about lost it at the periscopes.

In case you're unfamiliar with the genre, EVERY horse movie is about a plucky young person forming a special bond with an otherwise difficult and unruly horse. Because that's the dream, for a wild creature to totally trust you and become your buddy. It's the ultimate flattery.

That's not how I ever understood horse books/movies. Even as a child, I thought it was a sex thing. I would describe why this is, but I don't want google to call me a pedophile.
posted by DU at 5:38 AM on January 10 [2 favorites]

I LOVE this! I think this person is my sekrit twin.

Sometimes when I'm riding in a car, I look out the window and imagine I'm riding a horse running alongside the road and we're jumping over fences and mail boxes and benedictcumberbatches and stuff.

get out of my head!
posted by biscotti at 5:40 AM on January 10 [4 favorites]

And also sometimes when I’m jogging, I pretend I’m a horse, and then if I’m really in the groove I make quiet rhythmic clucking noises to myself so I’m also the rider?

Oh man, I'm so glad I'm not the only person who does this.

Sometimes I pretend I'm a centaur.
posted by fight or flight at 5:41 AM on January 10 [4 favorites]

Far better than the terrible movie it reviews!
posted by You Should See the Other Guy at 5:41 AM on January 10

At HEY SNORE HORSE! I had to go get a towel and another cup of coffee. Would that all movie reviews be this entertaining.
posted by davelog at 5:44 AM on January 10

Her site has some more awesome. (Some NSFW)
posted by DU at 5:45 AM on January 10

I'm glad she pointed out that the actor playing the main character is a typical Hollywood 'hunk' type. I saw the stage show in London, in which everyone looks like a real person, and I don't think I'd be able to take the Hollywood version seriously.
posted by anaximander at 5:55 AM on January 10

Her "Transformers 3" review is also awesome.
posted by mothershock at 6:00 AM on January 10 [2 favorites]

Too much horse mefi's own Mightygodking
posted by The Whelk at 6:02 AM on January 10 [2 favorites]

Somewhat unrelated, but people sure like stories and movies about war. Or those that take place during a war.

Not really a criticism but an observation. I guess it's just an extension of the whole Good vs. Evil thing. Or finding good in the midst of evil.
posted by bitteroldman at 6:04 AM on January 10

I give a little squeal (neigh?) of delight whenever I see one of her updates on the Hairpin. She's is delightful.

That's not how I ever understood horse books/movies. Even as a child, I thought it was a sex thing.

I also give a little squeal of delight whenever I see an update to MetaFilter's original series "DU reveals more about his psyche than the subject matter while commenting on an FPP."
posted by griphus at 6:06 AM on January 10 [2 favorites]

That was well worth A ROUSING HORSE LAUGH, all-in-all.
posted by Smart Dalek at 6:08 AM on January 10

My girlfriend and I took her visiting parents to see War Horse (the play) at the New London, and we enjoyed it very much. When the play ended and we boarded the taxi home, my girlfriend's mother was confirming that I did indeed enjoy the experience, and I said to her: "I loved it, although, at the end, we never did find out who won that damn war!"

And she looked at me doubtfully, and the thought obviously ran through her mind: "What? What the fuck? Was that some kind of joke, or are you completely fucking stupid? Are you joking, or are you the stupidiest person who has ever fucking lived, and you're going out with my daughter and you kiss her with that fat, ugly, stupid face of yours, and you are probably given her the stupid just by kissing her? For fuck's sake."

But I just looked out the taxi window, and thought: "WEEEEEE!!!! I'm a centaur!!!"
posted by the quidnunc kid at 6:10 AM on January 10 [23 favorites]

Whelk, I loved that review of mightygodking's too.

The linked one is also great. As someone who spent way too much of their youth drawing horses, I entirely approve. Nor, indeed, will I ever look at Benedict Cumberbatch quite the same way again.
posted by Pallas Athena at 6:26 AM on January 10

See if she had gone to Tinker Tailor, she would have seen Cumberbatch in a non horsey context and that's just wrong.
posted by The Whelk at 6:29 AM on January 10

She told me she liked art, but that she couldn't draw a straight line.

I told her if she could reach for something and pick it up, she could draw a line that was straight enough.

She said she wasn't interested in that kind of drawing, but had always liked horses. I said I did too, but they are hard to draw. She said, yes, that was very true.

She said she could do the body okay, but never get the head, tail or legs.

I told her she was drawing sausages, not horses.

She said, no, they were horses.
posted by Thorzdad at 6:30 AM on January 10 [2 favorites]

And also sometimes when I’m jogging, I pretend I’m a horse, and then if I’m really in the groove I make quiet rhythmic clucking noises to myself so I’m also the rider?

Oh man, I'm so glad I'm not the only person who does this.

Not making noises, but when I'm on a bus or train, I sometimes imagine people running on the roofs of houses or the powerlines and trees and stuff, and the trick is to imagine how they get from one to another as the stuff by the side of the road changes. A few years ago at the Walker in Minneapolis I saw a show by a Japanese artist where he described doing this (with ninja), and I, too, had a "get out of my head!" moment.

I realize this has nothing to do with horses, but there is no reason you couldn't imagine your ninja riding a ninja horse....
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:47 AM on January 10

Fantastico.
posted by Atreides at 6:55 AM on January 10

From her Transformers 3 review:

Frances McDormand and John Turturro are both in this movie! Fun Fact: They are both married to Coen Brothers.

OK, this is genius.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:03 AM on January 10

'Cause he gets up in the morning,
And he goes to the dark tower at nine,
And he comes back home at five-thirty,
Riding the same gryphon every time.
'Cause his world is built 'round captured teens,
It never fails.

And he's oh, so good,
And he's oh, so fine,
And he's oh, so healthy,
In his body and his mind.
He's a well respected man about town,
Doing the best things so glamorously.
posted by The Whelk at 7:15 AM on January 10

*cough* Never mind The Whelk, he's looking for the Bowie thread. This is the War Horse thread. No goblins in the War Horse thread!
posted by maudlin at 7:32 AM on January 10

How did I miss that Lisa Hanawalt has a blog! And an Etsy store!
posted by muddgirl at 7:56 AM on January 10

but people sure like stories and movies about war. Or those that take place during a war.

WARNING TVTROPES

Truffaut Was Right
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:58 AM on January 10

Awesome review.

In War Horse, the Magic Negro is played by a horse.
posted by Catblack at 8:20 AM on January 10

This is hilarious, but it needs more War Pony (YAY!)~
posted by ashirys at 8:46 AM on January 10

"I loved it, although, at the end, we never did find out who won that damn war!"

Well?
posted by Capt. Renault at 8:51 AM on January 10

As I can't abide the adulation of horses - they're virtually brainless, and what little brain they do have is psychotic - the sooner someone makes a spoof of War Horse using pantomime horses, the better. Imagine the battle scene, with the halves separating ...
posted by raygirvan at 9:03 AM on January 10

I don't mind the adulation of horses, because they are actually neither brainless nor psychotic, but instead totally awesome and perfect... so when someone makes a horse movie that fails to make me cry EVEN ONCE, I know it's not a good horse movie. Lisa Hanawalt made me cry with laughter, so she wins.

One thing she didn't mention that drove me crazy in the movie: when the kid is hiding in the tree and the horse looks up to find him up there. HELLO STEVEN SPIELBERG, horses don't look up. (That is your bizarre horse fact for the day. You could be standing in a tree throwing apples down on their heads and they still would not look up to see where they are coming from. I realize that this does not back up my contention that they are not brainless, but it is true nonetheless.)
posted by OolooKitty at 10:03 AM on January 10 [1 favorite]

horses don't look up

Next you'll be telling me that a verehere can't walk backwards...
posted by Hal Mumkin at 10:48 AM on January 10

when the kid is hiding in the tree and the horse looks up to find him up there. HELLO STEVEN SPIELBERG, horses don't look up.

So was it a CGI horse? Or did they just digitally remove the rope they used to pull his head up? And if one is making a film with a umptillion dollar budget and that film is about a horse, does one not hire at least one horse expert?
posted by George_Spiggott at 11:48 AM on January 10

Her stuff is brilliant. Thanks for introducing me to someone so talented and funny.
posted by Flashman at 11:52 AM on January 10

Maybe horses are actually smart enough to realize that it's polite to just ignore the asshole who's hitting them in the head with apples.
posted by muddgirl at 11:53 AM on January 10

My girlfriend and I took her visiting parents to see War Horse

I'm just disappointed that the quidnunc kid is taken.
posted by Dasein at 1:12 PM on January 10

Or did they just digitally remove the rope they used to pull his head up? And if one is making a film with a umptillion dollar budget and that film is about a horse, does one not hire at least one horse expert?

You would think so, but apparently not. And I would imagine that they did lift his head somehow... why you'd go through all that just for that shot, I have no idea. Anyway, I just wish they'd made up their minds whether they wanted to anthropomorphize the horse ala Black Beauty, or treat it like a horse, a la Seabiscuit. They kind of tried to do both, and it didn't work.
posted by OolooKitty at 2:50 PM on January 10

Here's another War Horse review.
posted by eye of newt at 9:46 PM on January 10

Is it wrong that I reeeeally want to hate this movie despite not having seen it? My parents attempted to drag me to the play and I managed to get out of it - the only part that sounded interesting was the puppetry. Since the movie has real horses, it doesn't even have that going for it, and it just sounds cheese-tastic. Am I making a terrible mistake?
posted by naoko at 11:35 PM on January 10

Lisa Hanawalt drew a horse in my journal when we were on a school trip in 10th grade. I still have that journal! Winning.
posted by prefpara at 4:21 AM on January 11

horses don't look up

Yes they do.
posted by biscotti at 5:07 AM on January 11

This writer is like the anti-Oatmeal.
posted by Gordafarin at 3:28 PM on January 12

That's dogs.
posted by Artw at 6:49 AM on January 13 [1 favorite]