The Brave One

This stands out from most child and animal pet movies. So realistic. Great acting from all. Feels genuinely Mexican. Well written story. The colour is vibrant and the version uploaded on YouTube is sharp and good quality. An enjoyable film for the whole family as it can be appreciated by any age group. I understand there was a lot of controversy behind the scenes but what underhanded things happened did not stop it being a worthwhile movie. Just a shame that reviewers have to write 800 characters to make the review acceptable. I think shorter reviews are equally as valid. Don't you think? I do.

This is the story of a young Mexican peasant boy who comes across a cow that is dying beneath a fallen tree branch and saves the calf she is birthing; a strong bond is established between the boy and the calf, a bond that persists as the calf turns into an aggressive bull that is being groomed for the the bullring. This bellicose beast is referred to as being "brave" in this film.

Ownership of the bull is a subject of debate throughout the film and at one point the boy gains an audience with the Mexican President to try to resolve the issue. Outside of the story being utterly preposterous, I had no problem with it.

This was filmed in Mexico in CinemaScope using highly saturated colors. There are some beautiful scenes of rural Mexico as well as a tour of Mexico City. The sweeping score by Victor Young invites grand emotion, but it stuck me as too exuberant, in the style of many scores of 1950s movies. The acting is uniformly wooden.

The highlights of the film are the captivating, and extended, bull fighting scenes. No matter what your opinion is of this controversial sport, it will be hard for you not to recognize its appeal based on these scenes. When an American visitor to Mexico expresses her dismay about the sport, her Mexican host notes that boxing and fox hunting are accepted, so why not bullfighting? He goes on to say that Mexicans know that death is never very far away, but that Americans are outraged by pain and, as for death, they may pass a law against it at any time.

What attracted me to this movie was seeing that it is based on an Oscar-winning story by Dalton Trumbo. The movie credits the story to one "Robert Rich," who was a front for Trumbo during the period of his being blacklisted during the McCarthy era (when Trumbo appeared before a Congressional committee and was threatened with a Contempt of Congress citation for not answering questions, he told the committee that that would be appropriate, since he had nothing but contempt for them). After having seen other movies with strong themes based on Trumbo screenplays, such as "Lonely are the Brave," "Papillon," and "Spartacus," I was looking forward to this film, but it does not live up to the quality of those. I was puzzled as to how Trumbo could have lapsed into such sentimentality, but then it occurred to me that he must have identified with the bull who defied attempts to be constrained and ultimately prevailed, just as Trumbo himself.

Mostly really good things here. It gets a little slow and repetitive in places.

The authenticity of the settings and the beautiful photography make it stand out from other pet stories. It does not feel like a Hollywood product

The story is not fresh, but to have the pet be a bull is. The era in which the story is told is different from today giving the film a lot of flavor (the priest blessing the animals).

The movie starts with a funeral procession for the main character's mother. It is understandable how Gitano became so important to me.

Lovely experience.

An excellent picture The Brave One has come down in history as an example of the incredible stupidity and hypocrisy of the blacklist. With Dalton Trumbo's struggle now a subject of a major motion picture a new and hopefully more enlightened audience can appreciate this wonderful film.

I'll leave it to the professional communist hunters to sniff out any left wing Marxist propaganda in The Brave One. All I saw is a touching film from RKO set in Mexico with no major or even minor American stars in it about a young boy who wants to save his beloved pet, a bull named Gitano who is raised as a fighting bull which means he gets one appearance only in the arena to die at the hands of a matador. Young Michel Ray is the boy Miguel and his father is Mexican film star Rodolfo Hoyos who did a few film appearances north of the Mexican border.

Young Ray is so determined to save his bull from slaughter he goes to none other than the President of Mexico to gain pardon for his bull. After that it's a tense race against time played against the background of Gitano giving his best against one of Mexico's best matadors. The bullfight scenes are outstanding and outstandingly photographed.

But a lot of this film is carried on the performance of Michel Ray who comes over so much like a real kid not just another kid actor. One of the best performances by a juvenile ever in the history of motion pictures and sad he did not receive any recognition for same.

I found it ironical that it was RKO on its last legs as a studio that produced this film. Just a couple of years earlier it was owned by Howard Hughes who got tired of it and gave it up to die a lingering death. Had Hughes still been in charge no way would The Brave One been done at his studio even with a pseudonym for a blacklisted writer.

That's how most people know The Brave One today when a later embarrassed Academy gave an Oscar to "Robert Rich" for Best Original Screenplay. It was Dalton Trumbo one of the infamous Hollywood 10 who wrote it, but it was after the award was given that that fact was discovered. That kind of hypocrisy exposed could have also had a large part in giving the blacklist an ignominious death. Maybe as much as Trumbo being hired openly to write the screenplay for Spartacus.

Shame on the studio bosses who while they supported getting these subversives out of Hollywood they also did not want to lose their talents either.

With Trumbo's own life now a motion picture maybe his work will get more critical review and The Brave One should be a standout there.

In Mexico, peasant boy Leonardo saves a calf in a storm which killed the mother cow. He raises it lovingly as his own Gitano. The cow was a gift to his father from Don Alejandro and eventually Gitano as well. After the Don's death, Gitano is nevertheless auctioned off as part of the estate. Leonardo sets off to save his beloved bull before it is killed in a bullfighting ring.

It's an American film of a Mexico story with confusing writing credit. It did win the writing Oscar which has since been reissued to blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo. I'm not sure if this deserved it, but awards are not exact science. I would have simplified the ownership back and forth in the first half of the movie. I would let the peasant family assume until the authorities take away the bull due to an unfair law interpretation. That would be a cleaner and more compelling story. I do really like the Mexican flavors despite this being an American film. The bullfighting may be cruel to some, but is nevertheless very compelling.