Secondhand Lions

I'd been meaning to see this film for a while, so last night I grabbed a copy from the local Blockbusters. I figured at the very least it worth viewing to see Michael Caine and Robert Duvall, two of my favorite actors. But it turned out to be such a decent film, that I can't help but strongly recommend it to others.

As advertised Secondhand Lions appears to be a your typical treacly coming-of-age story centered around Haley Joel Osment. And it is a coming-of-age story and it does pluck at your heart strings. But the lessons taught to Osment by his eccentric uncles (Caine and Duvall) are so traditional as to be almost subversive.

At one point, Duvall gives the following speech to Osment:

"If you want to believe in something then believe in it. Just because something isn't true, no reason you can't believe in it."

"All right. There's a long speech I give to young men. Sounds like you need to hear a piece of it. Just a piece. Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things that a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil. And I want you to remember this, that love, true love never dies. Remember that."

"Doesn't matter if it's true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in. Got that?"

Honor. Off hand I can't recall ever seeing a movie referring to honor in way that wasn't meant to be ironic, or sneering, or condescending. I nearly fell off the couch when Duvall rolled out that bit of dialogue; it's so.. old fashioned. Dangerous, in a way, to many of the 'values' held dear by society today.

But look, it's not a preachy movie. The lines above may seem hokey as they appear on this page, but when Duvall speaks them they seem entirely natural and uncontrived. So thoroughly does he portray his character that you can't imagine that he would say anything else.

Indeed, while Osment gives a decent performance I found that Duvall and Caine as the eccentric brothers Hub and Garth stole the show. They are the secondhand lions of the title - aging men who have lived lives of excitement and now have returned to Texas to await death, tempting it even. The movie is every bit as much about their coming-of-age as it about Osment's.

I've deliberately said little about the plot of the movie; I don't want to spoil it for anyone who acts on my recommendation. But this movie is worth watching for the same reason A Bronx Tale is worth watching: it's a movie that takes ideas and themes that are so simple as to be almost cliches, and presents them onscreen in a manner that is real and good and true.

One last quick note: Secondhand Lions gets points for involving Berke Breathed (of Bloom County fame). In the movie's final scene we're given to understand that Osment has grown up to be a cartoonist; the various clips and bits hanging in his office were obviously done by Breathed. Nice touch that.