War Horse (2011) on Netflix
Albert Narracott raises Joey, the colt his father bought. When rain ruins the crops and war is declared, Ted sells the horse to the cavalry, and Albert is too young to enlist.
- Netflix3.8/5
- IMDb7.2/10174,699 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes74%
Trailer
Plot summary
Before the First World War, in Devon, Albert Narracott teaches the colt Joey to come at the sound of an owl's call, and together they plow a rocky field that saves the family farm. Albert's mother Rose had wanted a working horse; his father Ted bought the Irish Hunter at auction instead. In 1914, when Germany goes to war, rain ruins the crops, and Ted sells Joey to a cavalry officer, Captain James Nicholls. Too young to enlist, Albert ties his father's regimental pennant to Joey's bridle and promises to find him. Joey is trained alongside a black stallion named Topthorn and sent to Flanders with a flying column.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about War Horse (2011)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- According to Spielberg, the film's only digital effects were three shots lasting three seconds, undertaken to ensure the safety of the horse involved: "That's the thing I'm most proud of. Everything you see on screen really happened."
- Eddie Redmayne had been rumored for the lead, but relatively unknown stage actor Jeremy Irvine was chosen as Albert Narracott; Irvine auditioned for two months and learned he had the part when the mock-up script handed to him to check his West Country accent turned out to be Albert telling Joey that Spielberg wanted him to play the part.
- Fourteen different horses played Joey - eight as an adult, four as a colt and two as a foal - with four more playing Topthorn; up to 280 horses were used in a single scene, and the main horses had a specialist equine make-up team, their coats dyed and markings added for continuity.
- Morpurgo researched the subject and learned that a million horses died on the British side, extrapolating an overall figure of 10 million horse deaths on all sides; of the million sent abroad from the UK, only 62,000 returned, the rest dying in the war or slaughtered in France for meat.
- Although it was not one of Spielberg's biggest box office successes, War Horse was the highest-grossing World War I film of all time until Wonder Woman overtook it six years later.
