Flicka - Review

Discuss this movie on our message board!

Length: 94 min

Rated: PG

Distributor: 20th Century Fox

Release Date: 2006-10-20

Starring: Tim McGraw, Maria Bello, Alison Lohman, Ryan Kwanten, Daniel Pino, Dallas Roberts, Kaylee DeFer, Jeffrey Nordling, Dey Young, Nick Searcy

Directed by Michael Mayer

Produced by Gil Netter

Written by Mark Rosenthal, Lawrence Konner

Reviewed by Josh Tyler : 2006-10-16 22:43:58

Sometimes the chasm between film critic and audience is simply too big to cross. It's no one's fault, we just see more movies than the rest of you. So when a critic watches a movie like Flicka, he see in it the things he's seen a hundred times before in film after film after film. If you've never seen any of the literally multitudes of other movies Flicka is drawing from, then there's a good chance you'll find it enjoyable. Unaware of the movie's unoriginality, I can see how the occasional filmgoer and especially young audiences will really enjoy it. There's nothing little girls love better than horses.

For the rest of us though, Flicka is an exercise in repetition. Yes, the scenery is beautiful and the horses quite stunning, but the script is just another in a long line of daddy-daughter conflict stories with a dash of animal husbandry mixed in. There hasn't been a new addition to the genre since The Little Mermaid, a movie that continues to define in the minds of youngsters and not-so-youngsters the nature of parent/child developmental conflict. Flicka doesn't redefine anything it just goes through the same familiar motions.

Based on the popular (and in my estimation quite good) novel "My Friend Flicka", the movie version stars Alison Lohman as budding young farm girl Katy McLaughlin. Katy is fifteen or sixteen, an age which Alison has been playing successfully for four or five years. No more. Lohman is twenty-eight and starting to look it. Flicka struggles mightily to young her up, but the result is more creepy than anything; they might as well have just put her hair in pigtails, given her a lollypop and called it a day for all the good it does. Once baby-faced Lohman has grown up, and it's about time her characters did too.

Katy returns home to her family's Quarterhorse ranch for the summer, and immediately starts butting heads with her father, played by country music star Tim McGraw. I'm not sure what it is that makes movie stars want to be musicians and musicians want to be actors, but in the case of McGraw his transition isn't wholly unwelcome. He's not exactly polished, but his stiff, folksy behavior serves him well here, as it did in Friday Night Lights. Katy's dad wants her to get an education, while Katy wants to run wild and free across the ranch, feeding fever dreams filled with horses.

While roaming the range Katy encounters a rare wild Mustang, helps capture her, and names her Flicka. Forbidden by her father to ride it, she develops a connection with the horse almost as a form of rebellion, secretly training and taming it late at night after dear old Dad is in bed. In the book, Flicka and Katy's relationship takes front and center. In the film, it's really just a catalyst for teenage angst. Before long Katy and her horse are in all kinds of trouble because of course, parents just don't understand.

The fractured relationship between Katy and her family works because the actors involved bring something to it. Lohan doesn't look the part, but she's still a fantastic actress, McGraw's awkwardness with acting actually works for his uncomfortable relationship with his daughter, and Maria Bello radiates strength and warmth as Katy's mother. Their voice is strong, they're just not singing a new tune.

That's ok. The real audience for this movie I suppose, is horse crazy little girls who'll never pick up on most of the background noise of family relationships cluttering up all the girl on horse affection happening in the film. It doesn't matter how many times she's seen it before, your daughter is going to love Flicka. If you haven't already been indoctrinated by her with all the other similarly themed movie material out there on this subject maybe you won't hate watching it with her.

Latest Movie Reviews:

Public Enemies

The Boat That Rocked (UK release)

My Sister's Keeper

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Ice Age: Dawn Of The Dinosaurs 3D

Josh's Must Own Movies List

Image Gallery for Flicka

Comment on “Flicka”

Note: This website is not meant for use by minors. The views expressed in the comments section below are not our own. This section is intended for discussion of the topic in the post above. Disagreement is encouraged, however comments which attack, insult, or threaten the author in a personal manner won't be published. Similarly, comments that we deem to be poorly worded, or wildly off topic will also not be approved and may be mocked. For free, uncensored, unfettered, and possibly dangerous discussion visit our forum.

Subscribe to topic comments

0 0 / 0
y n

cookie
May 2, 2008 at 16:40

hey i really think that flicka is a chickflick because when me and my friends went to see it 4 my birthday we all cryed -even my mom cried because she thought it was so sad

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Jordan
February 16, 2007 at 00:30

I think flicka was the best movie i have ever seen. It is definently not like other movies.It shows the strentgh and courage one girl alone has. I see my self in her all the way through to the end. I have watched that movie a million times since i bought it from the store.I believe this movie does give a good message, a message poeple need to learn a message people need to understand. I mean its a very good lesson and that movie taught me alot about what i like the most HORSES. I think we all need to wathc that movie and jim you wont be wasteing your 10 dollars either.

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Tracy
February 10, 2007 at 03:33

Whats with the the slashes by my (", ')?????

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Tracy
February 9, 2007 at 23:33

I personally think this was a great movie. I have been around horses since before I can remember. I agree with a few comments but not precisly the review. Like the cruelty to animals. Animals in movies are actors and actresses too. So they should be treated like the actors and actresses do in the same movie. I'm not saying you should give all the animals in the movies, a trailer, or stunt double. They should have some rights. A lot of people think animals can't have feelings or emotions, there wrong. I especially know that for a fact. If anyone who is reading this has been around horses to actually know them they know what I'm talking about. The feeling you get when your in a field of horses and you don't have a bucket of food, but a horse comes anyways. With the occasional nicker and nuzzle of a friends soft nose, its wonderful. I don't care how many of you is thinking drama, but you don't know how impacting a horse can be. To the critic who wrote that, yeah it's going to be the same thing over and over because almost everthing has been done already. I'm sorry if its judgemental but its a reply, an opinion, like what the critic wrote. My opinion is that this movie was great and things might be ridden out to long, you might or not be able to teach a dog new tricks, but a well trained or wild horse is an idol either for friendship, or freedom. Mostly both. This movie might not show a lot about mustangs, so we should remember this when we hear the complaints about them. They were here first before man decided to expand west. Here's an old saying, "Think Before You Act," thats why we should not do something we don't want to happen to us. Like being told to move out of home we've been living in since we were born. It might not have happened to me but I'm sure someone out there its happened to. So why should newcomers say hmm I like this piece of land so move. Thats what we did to the mustangs, and I don't think its right.

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

faith
January 11, 2007 at 12:55

great movie

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Elaine
November 14, 2006 at 13:15

WHY can't anyone ever make a movie about horses without having the horse nicker and whinny all the way through the movie?! Anyone with REAL horse experience knows that horses are relatively quiet, and almost NEVER make any sound when stressed, upset, happy, running, fearful, etc. etc. They use their voices almost exclusively to call to each other when separated, or when they see a bucket of grain heading their way. It seems like with all the wranglers around, somebody would tell the sound guys that horses don't talk nonstop like people do! It ruins the movie for anyone who really knows horses when there's so much nickering, whinneying, sniffling, snorting, et al! Please get real!

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

emily
November 4, 2006 at 21:53

I thought "Flicka" was a heartwarming and wonderful movie.But, not reccomeded for someone seeking an action movie.Tim Mcgraw did a great job as katies father.But, Allison Lohman is 26 year old and , I thought , was a little too old for the part as a sixteen year old.

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

emily
November 4, 2006 at 21:53

This movie was a heartwarming & wonderful movie.Many people didn't like it I read the reveiws and was thinking that i shouldn't go.But, I decided to go. I liked it. This movie was very inspirational. This movie is not reccomended for someone looking fo an action or scary movie. I think you have to be a certain kind of person to enjoy this movie(like me)I love every kind of movie from moives like "talladega nights" to "Flicka".

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Liz
October 25, 2006 at 15:19

Why no one should see this movie... No one should profit off of an animals death that could have been avoided.

Boycott Fox Films' Flicka! The American Humane Association, which supposedly protects animals in the film industry, receives its funds from the film industry, putting them squarely into bed with the Fox production company. They have gone out of their way to try to convince the public that animal endangerment and cruelty by Fox was just an "accident." That is kind of like the fox guarding the henhouse. And the only enforcement the AHA employs is whether to award a movie the little "No Animal Was Harmed" logo in the credits. On the set of Flicka, when I confronted AHA representatives to demand to know why they permitted the wild horse race in which the horse was brutally killed, they replied that it wasn't abuse if it wasn't illegal! This boycott is about more than 2 horses killed by Fox Films. It will send a message to the industry that movie goers will not tolerate cruelty and exploitation of animals in the making of films. And it will make the American Humane Association re-evaluate its role as pimp for the studios!

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Jim Wright
October 23, 2006 at 12:25

Im glad that you have seen so many movies Josh so that you can develop better opinions than those (me) that haven't seen as many movies. I was going to see this but after reading your review I opted not to, thanks for saving me $10. I mean who wants to see something that you have seen 100 times before.

Jim Wright
occasional filmgoer

Reply
0 0 / 0
y n

Lisa
October 19, 2006 at 04:12

Flicka was a beautiful horse movie with a message about wild mustangs ...(not just family problems) The horse work in that movie was amazing with beautiful scenes of running horses....And that horse! Nominate Flicka for a academy award...She was the best "actor" in that movie...her performance was flawlesss.

Reply

Subscribe to topic comments

Please login or sign up to post reply

Back to Flicka

Flicka - Review

Comment on “Flicka”

Leave a Reply