Solemplex To me, this movie is perfection.

Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Anoushka Slater While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

chartbury Like its predecessor, National Velvet, International Velvet (1978) boasts a stellar cast: teenager Tatum O'Neal, the gorgeous Nanette Newman, and leading men Christopher Plummer and Sir Anthony Hopkins. It also has a more believable plot and a top-notch writer/director in Bryan Forbes (The Stepford Wives, The Slipper and the Rose, The Guns of Navarone, Colditz). The main stories are Sarah Brown's (O'Neal), an American orphan who finds herself in England with an aunt she doesn't know (Newman as the adult Velvet Brown), and of the horses and people inextricably entwined in their lives. A poignant and graceful growing up story of the challenges facing a difficult teenager and the adults who raise her, International Velvet has something for both horse lovers and non horse-lovers alike. More important than Sarah's bid for the Olympics is the love that is won. The cinematography and Francis Lai's soundtrack are stunning and awards worthy; Tatum should have won another Oscar with this role, too. Beautiful scenery. An under-rated feel-good family film!Warning: Box of tissues useful when watching this movie as, amid the love and triumph, there is some gritty realism.

glamm70 Luckily, horse lovers, particularly girls, will sit through two hours of B-Grade acting and weak plots for fifteen minutes of footage of showjumping. National Velvet, in which a little girl called Velvet Brown wins the grand national, was set in the 1920s.....in International Velvet, the now adult Velvet has reached 40 years of age.....International Velvet should be set in the 1950s. Instead, somehow it is the 70s, Velvet is in a defacto relationship with big hair and flared jeans and the link is at best tenuous. Would have been great if Elizabeth Taylor had played the adult Velvet at a realistic age, since she played Velvet in the original that made her a star.... Whatever, the horses are beautiful, the footage of cross country events and the birth of a foal is wonderful.....so girls like my pony-mad daughter won't notice the glaring inconsistencies, extraneous characters that serve no purpose, or the soap operatic sentimentality and nauseating 70s soundtrack. Great acting by Tatum O'Neal and Anthony Hopkins....although he would probably prefer to forget it!

moonspinner55 Tatum O'Neal was the #3 box-office star the year before this was released. Although "Nickelodeon" did nothing for her, "The Bad News Bears" was a smash and much of the credit went to her. By the time this film wrapped, Tatum had grown up (too fast and too soon) and nobody wanted to see her with a faux English accent riding a horse. Orphaned American girl comes to stay with her aunt in England, who once was a famous horserider when she was a child. Belated follow-up to Elizabeth Taylor's girlhood triumph "National Velvet" has an excellent supporting cast: Nanette Newman is solid in Taylor's former role, now a grown woman living with wily Christopher Plummer, who is perfect; Anthony Hopkins is also superb as a stern taskmaster. Only O'Neal disappoints--odd considering the director was Bryan Forbes, who usually excels with younger actors. Forbes' film is also too long, with character conflicts and sketchy romantic interludes colorlessly handled. Tatum is much more convincing playing Sarah in her older teen years than playing her as a schoolgirl (O'Neal obviously had no schoolgirl experience to draw upon, thereby leaving her in alien territory). Not a wash-out exactly, but not the heart-tugging, tear-jerking family film it was intended to be. ** from ****

bibi-3 This is a very tender story about love, patience and gratitude. Has excellent and beautiful music, the best scenes and great actors. IT IS A FILM EVERY FAMILY SHOULD SEE