Outside Bet (2012)

Tagline: "Sometime in life, the odds are in your favour"
 
Starring: Bob Hoskins, Jenny Agutter, Philip Davis, Adam Deacon

Featured Racecourses: Sandown, Tweseldown, Windsor

Director: Sacha Bennett
Producers: Carolyn Bennett, Tony Humphreys, Terry Stone 
Writers: Mark Baxter & Paolo Hewitt (novel The Mumper), Nigel Smith, Sacha Bennett

Release Date: April 2012
Runtime: 96 mins

IMDB Synopsis: Set against the turbulent mid 1980s of money, privatization, unions and dramatic media evolution: A life-long group of friends find themselves at the bad end of a redundancy pay-out and invest their savings into a racehorse, hoping that one final race can turn their fortunes around.

Where to Buy: Amazon
Film Links: IMDB, Wikipedia

Personal Review


Set in the mid 1980s, a group of friends who all work in the printing or associated industries and regularly meet up in the Horshoe pub in Camberwell, get a chance opportunity to buy a racehorse. Mark 'Bax' Baxter (Calum McNab) thinks the risk is worth taking and with his father 'Threads' (Phil Davis) now dying from cancer the group are persuaded to part with their hard-earned money. The horse finishes stone last in it's first race but an Irish trainer called Jago (Vincent Regan) sees potential in 'The Mumper' and offers to buy him.  However the group don't want their dream to die, like Mark's father,  and in the end settle for Jago being their trainer. With privatisation taking a hold and the print workers going on strike, Union Rep Percy Smith (Bob Hoskins) and several other members of the group lose their jobs. With their life savings and redundancy cheques in hand, the group head off to Sandown races to risk everything on their beloved horse.

Based on a novel written by Baxter and Hewitt, I like the underlying principle of this film "friends buy a horse and risk their life savings on one big gamble",  but I don't particularly like the way the movie played out. There were just too many lead characters involved and we didn't really get a chance to understand their significance other than they were just friends who were happy to part with cash. The doting relationship between Mark Baxter and his dying father came across really well - Threads was a gambler who had lost everything but who always anticipated a big pay day was just around the corner - but I found the Mark / Katie (Emily Atack) love story quite strange. They had both fancied each other form an early age but Mark had never plucked up the courage to ask her out - however he was more than happy to bed the female boss in the newspaper office both before and during the strikes. This was one of Bob Hoskins last films and I thought his role as Percy 'Smudge' Smith was quite weak but some of the other senior cast members including Agutter (Shirley), Tushingham (Rita), Robson (Lil), Benson (Sefton) and Sutton (Alfie) made it more watchable - I did find Alfie's catchphrase of "I used to ........." quite annoying by the end though. I also think that the classic 'Pick Yourself Up' song, composed by Jerome Kern / lyrics by Dorothy Fields (1936) for the Astaire & Rogers film 'Swing Time', was sung one too many times in the film.

The first national hunt racing scene in the film comes from Windsor which is quite strange since jump racing stopped there in 1998 - the group are seen in the parade ring and then in the stands watching their horse finish last. The final scene comes from Sandown Park and we get a good look around the parade ring, the stands and the betting ring. However the actual racing sequences for both racecourse visits were filmed at Tweseldon point-to-point course (Fleet, Hampshire 1880-2013) which took away a lot of the authenticity for me. The film credits also mention Epsom racecourse but I don't recall seeing any shots from there.

Quite a nice happy ending but the film lacked authenticity and character development. More of a selling handicap hurdler than a grade one chaser for me. (Rating 3/10)

Favourite Quotes
Mark 'Bax' Baxter: "Money isn't everything, it's OK, it's alright. The only regrest in life are the chances you never took."


MOVIE STILLS