National Velvet (1945)

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

Velvet's parents always addressing each other as Mr. Brown and Mrs. Brown seemed rather bizarre and cold. Angela Lansbury was a lovely young lady portraying eldest daughter Edwina. But I didn't understand the purpose of Juanita Quigley as sister Melvolia who was practically a lookalike for Liz Taylor's Velvet. As a child star Liz was fantastic in this wonderful family film.

Yes. Indeed! - Regardless of National Velvet now being 70 years old, this entertaining, heart-warming tale about trust, personal victory and following one's dream is, without a doubt, an endearing, MGM classic that can be enjoyed by the whole family.With an excellent cast, headlined by Elizabeth Taylor (12 at the time), Mickey Rooney, and Anne Revere, National Velvet's story is a rather charming "horse tale" that jauntily crosses the finish line as a bona-fide winner.This lush, Technicolor treat (which was adapted from Enid Bagnold's novel of the same name) was set in the 1920s (in England) in the rural, coastal county of Sussex.A real stand-out performance in this first-rate picture was that of Anne Revere (who played Velvet's mother, Araminty Brown). Revere won an Oscar for her "Best Supporting Actress" role.I certainly recommend National Velvet highly to anyone who truly enjoys a big, wholesome slice of vintage, Hollywood movie-making.

National Velvet Owning a horse is basically comprised of feeding one end and cleaning up the other. However, the relationship between pony and person in this drama is much more involved than shoveling equine scat.After winning a lively colt in a raffle, the equally spirited Velvet (Elizabeth Taylor) begins breaking-in her beast for a national steeplechase.With a former jockey Mi (Mickey Rooney), Velvet and her steed, dubbed The Pi, perfect their steeple leaping performance.But when the jockey hired to ride The Pi at the Grand National backs out, it's up to Mi to put away his past and get back in the saddle - or is it?With Sussex, England serving as the pastoral setting of this girl-meets-horse tale, National Velvet is as much a visual treat as a narrative one.Unfortunately, when your horse can jump over fences and ditches, your corral has to be, like, 20-feet tall. (Green Light)vidiotreviews.blogspot.ca

This movie is all charm. It is adorable, touching, incredibly sweet, and terribly precious. There is not one moment that does not touch your heart. From the Brown family - with the sisters Edwina (a young Angela Lansbury!) and Malvolia (Juanita Quigley) and the precious, freckled, innocent, and clever Donald (Jackie Jenkins). The Gibraltar of wisdom, Mrs. Brown (Anne Revere) and the Irish, folksy, can't-help-but-love-him Mr. Brown (Donald Crisp). Not to mention the stars of the program, Mi Taylor (Mickey Rooney) and Velvet (the incomparable Elizabeth Taylor). Velvet is all heart, so full of her love for horses, so innocent and pure in her selflessness for Pie. And Mi, the ne'er-do-well who finds his courage and sense of self in Velvet's pure, unadulterated trust in him. What character dwells deep in these people, what stories, what charm! And even though I knew the story, I cheered and clapped in the racing scene, and I teared up with the trust and wisdom of Mrs. Brown to Velvet. A real classic, timeless and truly beautiful, that will leave you warm and inspired.