A HORSE NAMED WINX Reviewed by GREG KING
Documentary
Director: Janine Hosking
Australians love their sports, especially the sport of horse racing. Australian filmmakers have also celebrated some of the champions of the racetrack with Simon Wincer’s 1983 film biopic Phar Lap; also his 2011 moving film The Cup, about 2002 Melbourne Cup winner Media Puzzle and jockey Damien Oliver’s personal journey; and Ride Like A Girl, Rachel Griffiths’ 2019 stirring biopic about Michelle Payne, the first female jockey ever to win a Melbourne Cup.
This documentary focuses on Winx, the Australian racehorse considered the greatest of all time. As a champion Winx is regarded as even better than Phar Lap or Makybe Diva, or even the US’s champion Secretariat. She won an impressive 33 wins in a row, including an unprecedented four W S Cox Plates, a feat unlikely to ever be repeated, and cemented her place in Australian turf history. During the course of her racing career Winx‘s winnings totaled some $26 million. While Winx’s achievements are will documented, this well-researched and well-made documentary takes audiences behind the scenes to reveal the lesser known story of how the team behind the horse transformed it into a champion.
The film is written and narrated by Andrew Rule, a respected sports journalist, and it traces Winx’s story from birth. As a young foal it was not highly regarded and its owners picked it up fairly cheaply in 2013 at the annual Magic Millions Gold Coast Sale in Queensland. But the horse failed to impress with its first few starts, but once Winx began its unbeaten streak the horse gained in popularity and was quickly dubbed “the people’s horse.” In 2019 Winx retired from racing, suffered some serious health problems with colic, endured the agony of having her first-born foal stillborn, and eventually gave birth to a foal which sold for a world record $10 million.
A Horse Named Winx is something of a labour of love for its director Janine Hosking (The Eulogy, etc), who spent four years putting the film together. With unprecedented access to the team behind Winx Hosking has been able to delve behind the scenes to follow Winx’s journey. The film features an extended and very revealing interview with trainer Chris Waller conducted by sports journalist Cameron Williams and he speaks about the weight of expectation on the horse once it kept winning. Jockey Hugh Bowman, who rode Winx throughout its victorious run, doesn’t add a lot to the mix however. Their affection for the horse is obvious. There are also some moving interviews with the owners – Debbie Kepitis, Peter and Patty Tighe and the late Richard Treweeke – who talk about what Winx meant to them. They also resisted calls to race the horse overseas believing that it would not be in Winx’s best interests. These candid interviews provide some insight into the effort that went into turning the horse into a champion.
The film captures Winx’s extraordinary journey. There is plenty of footage of Winx in action, and the film has been beautifully shot by cinematographer Kevin Scott (the recent Midnight Oil documentary The Hardest Line, etc). The wealth of archival footage and interviews has been deftly edited together, althoughthe footage of her wins does seem a bit repetitive.
I felt that this could have been tightened up in the editing phase and would have been much more effective as a 45 or 50 minute documentary.
Nonetheless, A Horse Named Winx will certainly hold plenty of interest for lovers of sport and the sport of horse racing in particular, and it may hold curiosity value for the casual film goers.
★★★
