"The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly" and "Secretariat"

        Old movie and new movie. One came out back in the fifty's, one, this past month. Any of you who knows anything about movies knows which was which. I know almost nothing about modern movies, and yet I still know which is which. As far as I can tell, these two movies have almost nothing in common, in fact, the only reason I grouped them together is for the mere fact that I saw both of them within the past two days.  "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly" I saw Sunday when I was sick, "Secretariat" I saw yesterday.
        So here we go, I'm going to play the role of movie reviewer. (Drum role please)
        TGTB&TU, is a old movie with modern ideas. It blurs the lines of good very hard, the "good guy" being played by the most famous modern cowboy of the golden screen, Clint Eastwood. In my opinion, the only reason he's a good guy is because he keeps the guy dubbed "ugly" in the title, from getting his grubbing hands on the money to soon, and because he shoots the bad guy in the end. One of the few things I like about the movie, is that, since the made the good guy not-so-good, they at least made the bad guy, REALLY BAD. Everything from shooting an old man in bed to torturing prisoners to see if they have info about a missing stash of $200,000 in gold coins. The "ugly" guy is a renegade who is wanted by the law and is constantly escaping due to the help of Clint. (Great good guy!) All through the movie, it is a race for who can get to the gold first, at all costs. A movie that proclaims in broad terms, "The end justifies the means." At least, that's the message it proclaims to a Christian. To a worldly mindset, all the stuff that I would qualify as wrong, they define as "normal, and just fine." All in all, I'm not very impressed with the movie. It also casts a very dark and fuzzy shadow on the civil war, casting out as a very different kind of war. Not a "family movie night" movie, by a long shot.
        Ok, onto the second movie. "Secretariat".
        It has a much better after-taste in your mind than TGTB&TU. Its based on a true story of a horse, the title being his name, starting from nothing and winning massive awards and setting times nobody thought he ever could. There is a very hard driving theme of "keep striving" all through it, when faced with losing her farm and her horse, Penny, the main character, played by Diane Lane, says she will not back down to pressure and keep going. (At least thats the gist of it) However, there is an interesting line or two that caught my attention. She was saying they will not live the rest of their lives in regret, and they will see the horse race, and he will win, and they will rejoice every day. That's what caught me. Rejoice every day why? Because a horse won a hunk of metal and ran around a dirt circle faster than anybody else? This shows a definite worldview. In fact, the movie is loaded with off worldview. It is loaded with feministic idea's, the wife being the hero of the movie, constantly praising the "strong woman", never in word but in typical cinema-graphical medium. She is showed as heroic for leaving her home time and time again, putting her family on the back-burner, so she can go to her races, and take care of the farm in Va, etc, and is praised for being tough by toughing all of life's challenges and making it all the way to Belmont. She does all of what she does in the movie to see the horse win, to give it a chance she never had, she says. She says she gave up her life out of college to be a housewife, and now she wants to give her life to get this horse in the racing world. As far as racing goes, it is absolutely stunning what that magnificent creature of God did, that no other creature could do. It said in a special feature on the dvd, that after he died and they did an autopsy, he had a heart twice the size of what he should. An incredible creature with and incredible story. The movie has humor as well, the colorful trainer, and his WEIRD choice of clothes and hats, and spouting french when he's upset or angry, and his unforgettable attempt to golf, the indestructible jockey, who probably doesn't top 5'3", who, upon first seeing him, is bruised, got lines where his racing goggles were, is on crutches, and is raring to go on the next race, and other things here and there that are quite funny to behold.
        All in all, not a bad movie, very well done cinema-graphicly and actor wise. Requires some discernment to pick out the worldview hints, but if you can pick out the good, and ignore the bad, its well worth it.
        Since I hardly ever see secular movies, I'll probably comment on most of them that I do see, Stay tuned. :)