Secondhand Lions
April 2004 Reviewed by: Anthony Di Marco Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

It is refreshing to a see a film like Secondhand Lions. Rather than dwelling on the dark side of humanity, it celebrates the importance of imagination and the human spirit.

The cast is very good; only Haley Joel Osment's sporadic overacting and Michael Caine's stilted Texas drawl shock the viewer into disbelief. Robert Duvall is the rock. The captivating actor plays Hub, an aging man who escapes to his imagination and past to keep his mortality at bay. He is a soul who needs memories to stay sane as he fears becoming old and hopeless. His brother Garth (Caine) bears witness and recounts stories of his brother's past to Walter (Osment), a nephew, whose scatterbrained mother suddenly abandons him. The stories seem too unbelievable, too tall, to be taken seriously, but Walter is hungry to believe in something good and pure.

This is a children’s film, so it’s important for adults to keep things in perspective. Tim McCanlies' script often teeters between the sappy and melodramatic, and his direction tends toward being heavy-handed. Still, the values he defends are worthy, and largely absent from the majority of children’s films.

New Line typically produces DVDs with excellent picture quality. Unfortunately, Secondhand Lions fails to continue this trend. There is a noticeable amount of MPEG noise throughout the film. Color fluctuates from rich and clean to dull and washed out. In fairness, I must admit that I received a pre-release set of DVDs, so there may have been an issue with the duplication.

Audio is good, but not great. The surround mix does a nice job at conveying the wide-open spaces of Texas, but lacks punch when the action calls for it. The roar of the lion in the film and the sound of gunfire did not have the snap that I expect from a well-balanced surround mix. Vocal intelligibility is excellent, however.

The set of extra features straddles the line between being informative and feeding the marketing machine. What I found most interesting about the documentaries was the contrast between the narrator’s very Hollywood delivery and the laid-back, down-to-earth nature of the filmmakers. It felt like New Line's marketing department didn’t think the finished product had enough zing. The result doesn’t work, and instead sounds like the narrator is selling cold remedies. I would have enjoyed the extras if the producers had just let the people in front of the camera speak instead of trying to make the information dramatic.

I did not know McCanlies wrote the screenplay for The Iron Giant until after I saw Secondhand Lions. In hindsight, this isn't a surprise. Both films share a similar tone and humanity. The difference is that The Iron Giant is the "classic" of the two, while Secondhand Lions is a "nice," solid film that could find a welcome place in a family collection.

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