…that you’d decide to re-watch Steven Spielberg‘s War Horse on Hulu Plus…imagine!

Posted on 1.9.12: “My own oft-repeated view is fact that anyone with a smidgen of taste or perspective knew from the get-go that Spielberg’s film didn’t have the internals that would make it go all the way, and that the only thing it had going for it was the fact that many respectable professionals (including IndieWire columnist Anne Thompson and Fox publicity honcho Bumble Ward) admitted it had made them cry.

“I have an odd theory. I could be off-base, but I believe that a particular line of dialogue did a lot to stop War Horse. That’s right — one line.

“It was spoken during the no-man’s-land, barbed-wire scene when the British and the German soldier are cutting through the wire that has totally entangled poor Joey. And they start talking about this and that, and the British soldier says (I’m paraphrasing from memory), “You know, here we are…soldiers from opposing sides, standing in a muddy no-man’s-land at night and helping this poor beast get free of the wire. Heh…you know something? I think we should give him a name. But what could we reasonably call him, given that he’s a horse and we’re in the middle of a war? Wait…I know! I think we could call him ‘war horse.’ It kinda fits, you know?”

“I was already slumping in my seat when that scene began. But after the British soldier said it I muttered to myself, “Holey moley! All right, that’s it…no way this thing wins the Best Picture Oscar. In fact, it may not even be nominated.”