Buck: The Real-Life Horse Whisperer

• by Rahul Chadha, June 02, 2011

This post was written by STF blogger Aaron Cael.

Like the film’s subject and namesake, the camerawork in Buck expertly captures the horses in the film as thinking creatures with their own emotional worlds by shooting them at eye level. It’s a telling technique that underscores the main thrust of what the film’s characters are trying to understand as they work with their horses. It’s the humans, though, that get the best lines and arguably the most transformative experiences in working with Buck Brannaman, who teaches clinics in Natural Horsemanship, an approach that replaces violently “breaking” a horse with “starting” a horse by establishing trust and building a true union between horse and rider.

Buck chronicles Brannaman’s path from a six-year-old professional trick roper in Corn Pops commercials to success running riding clinics worldwide—and even serving as the inspiration for the book and film The Horse Whisperer. It’s a story that comes out naturally, interspersed with Brannaman’s daily teachings in his clinics, and with archival film and photographs pulling in hints of his dark days as an abused child performer. The film’s structure handles this beautifully, building empathy while teaching, bringing in pieces of the story at just the right moments and lingering on the natural beauty of the horse and wide open spaces where Brannaman plies his trade.

Amazingly, this is director Cindy Meehl’s first film. Meehl first met Brannaman as a horse owner, recommended to one of his clinics by friends who vouched for his ability to transform not only the rider-horse relationship, but one’s approach to life too. While his approach stresses gentleness, “He is not easy on anybody,” Meehl said. “And we all like that.” Some of that drive and discipline no doubt paid off in the process of editing down the 300 hours of footage her crew shot over two and a half years.

[Photo: From left, Stranger Than Fiction Artistic Director Thom Powers and Director Cindy Meehl, courtesy of Simon Luethi]

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