The Rider's Honor
The young South Dakota cowboy Brady (Brady Jandreau) is a good horse trainer. Unfortunately, he was injured in the head accidentally by a horse during a horse racing performance, so he had to return to his home to recuperate. But he still did not give up his love for horses. When recuperating, he or Faxiao spent the night on the grassland. To support his family, he also has to do odd jobs at a local retail store. And of course sometimes help ranchers with horses. Only the doctor told him that he could no longer participate in Marseille because of the severe brain injury.
One day he used his savings to buy a good horse, Apparo, with the help of his father. His happiness is riding the Apparo on the vast grassland. But one day, Apparo crossed the barbed wire and injured his leg, and he had to kill him with pain.
He made another attempt to retake the race, and as he was about to mount, he found himself unable to hold the reins due to an old injury. He slowly put down the rope, shook hands with his companions, left the beloved and noisy arena, and slowly walked to the side of the court to wait for his family.
It can be said that this is a strange film. Overall, this is a true story, and the main character in the story is the actor himself, and the other actors are also his family. Of course the story is also his own experience.
Now I have to mention Chloé Zhao, a director born in Beijing. She can be said to be a second-generation star who came to the United States to work hard alone. She met the male lead Brady when she was filming the last song "Songs My Brothers Taught Me (2015)", and the idea of shooting him was brewing at that time. Brady was injured a year later, and she decided to bring the story to the screen. The film won the Cannes International Art and Prose Film Federation Award.
I also originally saw it as an inspirational story. It's more of a hardship experience after a setback in one's life. Facing a completely unfamiliar road, of course there was pain and struggle. Fortunately, he was able to rely on the company of horses to help him through this difficult time.
Looking at it, I found that although Masai is not a job of licking blood on the edge of a knife, it is also full of danger. He was also paralyzed in the hospital due to an injury in Marseille when he was young, and he visited him every month in the hospital. Finally, the two of them looked back on their sassy and heroic appearance on horseback.
Each of us has had a similar experience more or less professionally or emotionally, and it's not necessarily as terrifying as Brady. But everyone walks this path in their own unique way. You can see his process from this film, and at the press conference held in this film, you can see that Brady has come out of the shadows and found his new life. Although Brady conceded in the end, he is still our hero.
There have been movies before that used real people as the characters themselves. A recent example is "The 15:17 to Paris (2018)" by Clint Eastwood, but it's not so easy to tell a story well . Brady said at the time that since she's not afraid of horses, I'm not afraid of cameras. They did succeed.
South Dakota belongs to several desolate states in the Midwest of the United States, and has the fifth lowest population and population density in every state in the United States. In our terms, it's more earthy. As a result, there are also many Indian reservations (see my blog post, " Blood and Bloody "Hunting the Windy Valley "). It may be because of the vastness of the land, which is suitable for raising horses. As a Chinese, Zhao Ting's interest in this place is also a rare thing. Her first film "The Song My Brother Taught Me to Sing" is the story of the reservation. When we Chinese come to the United States, we always like to settle in big cities. It would be better if we get together with Chinese people. Therefore, big cities in the United States have Chinatowns. In our imagination, it is easiest for people in China to film Chinatown stories, such as the famous "The Joy Luck Club" "The Joy Luck Club (1993)", or at least Chinese stories, such as the recently popular "Crazy Rich Asians". Crazy Rich Asians (2018)” (see my blog post, “ What Crazy Rich Asians Picked ”). However, she went to a reservation where there are not many white Americans to shoot the local scenery and people, and it was praised by the film industry, which was so cool.
If you like to ride a horse and gallop in the wilderness, this movie is for you.
Choreographer: Zhao Ting
Brady Zandro played him.
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