Grand Champion (2002)

Directed by: Barry Tubb | 93 minutes | comedy, family | Actors: Joey Lauren Adams, Jacob Fisher, Emma Roberts, Barry Tubb, Hokey, Cache Williams, Candance Henry, Broderick Beaver, Steven Bland, Natalie Maines, Sue Molnar, Eloise DeJoria, Andy Buckley, Andy Smith Jr., Jo Carol Pierce, Bruce Willis, Julia Roberts

Usually dogs or horses are chosen to act as man’s best friend in family movies. Every now and then other animals are allowed to star in family movies; think of the orca from ‘Free Willy’ (1993) and the piglet from ‘Babe’ (1995). But we have never seen a bull as a movie star before. In the diminutive family film ‘Grand Champion’ from 2002, it is really a cow that plays the leading role. We see how he is born on the Keen family farm in the small town of Snyder, in western Texas. Especially the children of this single-parent family develop a close bond with the calf, whose mother does not survive the birth. Son Buddy (Jacob Fisher) decides, following his late father’s example, to train the cow and make it big and strong so that he can participate in competitions. And although the family is far from wealthy, they still manage to raise enough money to move to the fictional city of Big Texas to participate in the prestigious Livestock Show. There he has to face the son of Snyder’s richest man, who has no intention of giving in easily.

The fact that Buddy calls his bull Hokey (slang for super sweet melodrama) speaks volumes: ‘Grand Champion’ is an accumulation of soggy clichés and stereotypes. Take for example the fact that Buddy’s nemesis Bloomer is dressed all in black, drives a big black pickup and walks with an empty-headed blond bimbo on his arm who has nothing useful to say. In addition, the story has the necessary predictable subplots that go nowhere. Buddy’s mom Hallie (an annoying Joey Lauren Adams, totally unbelievable as a wretched Texan widow) flirts with the town’s newfound and lonely vet (played by the film’s debut director, Barry Tubb), but it’s barely dwelt on long enough. this romance. The lack of the father of the Keen family is also barely touched upon. Tubb, who also wrote the screenplay, remains only on the surface and takes a different path in the second half of the film. When Buddy discovers that his beloved bull Hokey is being sold for a lot of money after the Livestock Show to a very wealthy millionaire (dark cameo by Bruce Willis, who is clearly in this for money only) who wants to sell Hokey as barbecue meat, the boy decides to sell the animal kidnapping his best friend Edgar (Cache Williams) to get him to safety. Of course they don’t get away with that, because both the new owner of Hokey and the evil Bloomer – who sees his chance to have his own son crowned as the winner – follow the three closely.

Whether filmmaker Tubb’s heart is in the right place, let’s face it. The fact is, he wants to score easily with a youth-oriented sentimental dragon. A hillbilly-style youth film, full of exaggerated ‘cute’ moments where the enamel spontaneously jumps from your teeth; there’s bound to be an audience for it in the southern states of the US. Fanciful souls who immerse themselves in the nostalgia and romance of cowboy life. But if your roots are elsewhere, the shaky story of ‘Grand Champion’ won’t be able to touch you. Anyone born outside of Texas will be annoyed by the clumsy acting (child stars Fisher, Williams and Emma Roberts can hardly be blamed, by the way), the sluggish superficiality and the predictable and increasingly unbelievable plot. They’ll also wonder why Willis, Julia Roberts (in a tiny cameo) and plenty of country stars including Dixie Chick Natalie Maines signed on for this film. Is there really nothing good about ‘Grand Champion’? Well, Danny Moder’s camera work – not entirely coincidentally Julia Roberts’ husband – is warm and colorful and bull Hokey does his job exemplary. He is, in fact, the only one whose star continues to shine throughout the film.