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Secondhand Lions recommends "believing in something"

When 12-year-old Walter's mother (Kyra Sedgwick) abandons him for the summer on the remote Texas farm of his two crazy uncles, he's scared and hurt. He's also skeptical about what he's been told: That Uncle Hub (Robert Duvall) and Uncle Garth (Michael Caine) have a fortune hidden on their property. As the days pass, Walter (Haley Joel Osment) warms up to the uncles, his imagination fueled by Garth's hard-to-believe tales about the adventures he and his brother enjoyed in foreign countries, battling nasty villains and defending the honor of a beautiful princess. He also learns why Uncle Hub is prone to fits of melancholy and sleepwalking. Could these guys be telling the truth? Could these geezers, who like to sit on their front porch and fire rifles at approaching salesmen, really be living legends?

Writer/director Tim McCanlies's film Secondhand Lions has a lot in common with the animated feature that he wrote a few years back: The Iron Giant. Both films are about a boy without a father figure. In both tales, a dislocated figure, larger-than-life and bit melancholy, inspires the boy, and is likewise inspired by his wide-eyed wonder and faith. The two films also include a meddling investigator who represents another possible father figure, a man who is rash and dangerous. And in the end, both films celebrate the value of imagination, faith in far-fetched ideas, and the idea that age has nothing to do with importance.

The veteran actors are in fine form as the grouchy old men, and Osment, although he may have been miscast as "an ordinary kid," shines in one emotional scene after another. The script is whimsical and full of ideas, but it spends too much time telling instead of showing. As a result, its multitudinous platitudes and morals feel tacked on. Fortunately for viewers, there is plenty to enjoy in spite of the sentimentalism.

Next week in Film Forum, I'll feature a chat with Tim McCanlies about his film. My full review and my interviews with Duvall, Caine, and Osment will appear in the new issue of Paste Magazine this month.

Other religious press critics are receiving the film with applause and enthusiasm, happy to have a family film they can recommend without apology.

Frederica Mathewes-Green (Our Sunday Visitor) describes it as "a sweet story … balanced by a sense of masculine nobility that is virtually never seen in movies."

Michael Elliott (Movie Parables) agrees, calling it "a sweet, life-affirming tale. McCanlies … has struck cinematic gold by illustrating the impact that a father figure can have upon the development of a young and impressionable teen."

David DiCerto (Catholic News Service) says it "hits all the right emotional notes, resulting in an enchanting story about family and the transmission of values as generations change hands." He also praises Duvall and Caine as "masters at the top of their game."

Steven D. Greydanus (Decent Films) objects to the film's central sentiment, spelled out in a speech that Hub (Duvall) gives to Walter: "If you want to believe in something, then believe in it! Just because something isn't true, that's no reason you can't believe in it!" Greydanus objects: "Expressed this way, this is bogus sentimentality, not belief or faith—and this notion casts a long shadow over the rest of the film. McCanlies's heart is in the right place, but his head could use a little straightening out."

Nevertheless, Greydanus gives Lions a pass: "What carries the film in spite of these weaknesses … are the appealing relationships that develop between Walter and his uncles, tongue-in-cheek serial-cliffhanger style flashbacks of derring-do … a couple of subversively funny subplots … and some good-hearted themes about responsibility, growing up, and old age."

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September (Web-only) 2003, Vol. 47