Racing Stripes
I didn’t mind the large woman pushing a stroller back and forth constantly in front of me. I barely even noticed the baby crying one row behind me. This film completely captured not only my attention, but that of my twelve-year-old son’s and nine-year-old daughter’s.
Hayden Panettiere, last seen as the coach’s daughter in Remember the Titans, stars as Channing, a teenage girl living with her father and a menagerie of animals on an old farm. Her mother had been a jockey and had died during a race a few years back. Horse racing was in her blood, but her controlling father couldn’t stand the thought of losing his daughter the same way he lost his wife.
With her father’s help, Channing raises an abandoned baby zebra and names him creatively, “Stripes”. As he grows into a young adult zebra, teen star Frankie Muniz provides his voice, telling anyone that will listen how desperately he wants to race like the thoroughbreds he sees every day at the farm across the way.
The other animals on the farm befriend Stripes and help him in his plight to be a racer. He is trained by Dustin Hoffman as a grumpy old pony named Tucker, and nurtured by an old goat voiced by Whoopi Goldberg. Joe Pantoliano provides the voice for a jumpy pelican, named Goose, escaping the mob, and Sandy, the beautiful white mare, as Stripes’ love interest is voiced by Mandy Moore. There’s no mistaking David Spade’s voice as he and Steve Harvey provide the voices behind two rapping pesty flies.
Spade isn’t the only ex-star of Just Shoot Me in this movie, as Wendie Malick stars in it as well as a tough-as-nails horse owner, going for the win, and not letting anything stand in her way, including an ambitious zebra and his young owner.
In the beginning, I was disappointed that it was a “talking animals” film, but it didn’t seem to detract from it, and only seemed to add to it. I’m not sure if the story could have been told as well without knowing what Stripes was thinking and feeling. It certainly added to the humor of it as Tucker questions why a pelican is named “Goose”, and then informs him his name is Duck, which Goose questions. This leads to “Duck?’ “Duck.” “Duck?” “Goose.” Typical Disney-type humor, although it’s actually a Warner Brothers production.
Aside form the humor, the film also gives us two underdogs to root for – the motherless teenage girl and her pet zebra, both of which only know life on the farm. The move is much like a combination of Seabiscuit and Babe. Heartwarming and fun.
I walked out of the theatre not feeling my cramped neck, but instead writing a glowing review in my head. My son walked out singing David Spade’s rap tunes, and my daughter walked out asking why her menagerie of stuffed animals included not a single zebra. Something tells me she’ll have one, along with the DVD of this movie, very soon.
