The classic story of a boy and his horse is beautifully filmed, featuring nice scenes of the boy and the horse frolicking on a deserted island. In the first half of this film, there's hardly any dialog. Yes, film is a visual medium, but looking at pretty pictures can become boring after a while. There's no character development and once the action moves to civilization, it becomes the standard "National Velvet" type of clichéd story, complete with Rooney doing a variation of his role in the earlier film. Ballard's tendency for lingering shots makes this extremely slow-moving. The horse gives a good performance, although, curiously, it is dark brown, not black.
Review of The Black Stallion
