Rating: PG
Genre:
Comedy Drama
Release Date: 05/06/2003
SubTitles: French/Espanol
Dubbed: English
Sound: DD2
Run Time: 121 Minutes
Flags: Adult Situations, Questionable for Children, Adult Language
Distributor/Studio: Universal Studios
A cowboy-turned-huckster unexpectedly finds love as he tries to regain his self-respect in this
romantic comedy drama.
Sonny Steele (
Robert Redford) is a one-time rodeo
star whose career as a cowboy has ground to a halt. He makes a good living as a spokesman for Ranch Breakfast, a sugar-coated cereal for kids, but he's lost most of his self-respect in the process; his boss, corporate mogul Hunt
Sears (
John Saxon), considers him a property rather than a human being, and
Sonny has developed a serious problem with alcohol.
Sears' cereal company is negotiating a highly profitable merger with another firm and brings
Sonny to Las Vegas for a publicity stunt, in which
Sonny, wearing a garish cowboy outfit complete with blinking lights, will ride on-stage at Caesar's Palace aboard prize-winning thoroughbred stallion
Rising Star. When
Sonny discovers
Sears' men have drugged the horse so that it will be able to walk on an injured leg, he's appalled, and he rides
Rising Star off the stage at Caesar's and into the Nevada desert, looking for grazing land where he and the horse can heal their wounds.
Sears is shocked to discover that
Sonny has run off with a 12 million dollars, and he realizes that
Sonny knows enough to make his firm look very bad in the press, potentially scotching the merger.
Sears files charges against
Sonny and posts a reward for
Rising Star's safe return, though he implies that it wouldn't bother him if
Sonny died in the rescue attempt.
Hallie Martin (
Jane Fonda), a television journalist covering
Sonny's Vegas appearance, is convinced that something is fishy and manages to catch up with him in the desert; as
Hallie tries to get
Sonny to tell her his story, the has-been cowboy and the city-girl reporter fall in love.
The Electric Horseman also stars
Valerie Perrine and
Willie Nelson; the
country & western star made his screen debut in this film and has a very memorable line about tequila and trailer hitches.
~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
