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BEHIND THE SCENES FOR THE FILMING OF PHAR LAP'S STORY
A mystery star
strides out as a
great turf hero
What happens to a film-star
racehorse when the lights go out,
when the movie's over, and the film
is in the can?
There's some confusion about ehe big
red horse that is playing Phar Lap in
the film of the same name, due to fill
the cinema screens of the nation with
thundering hooves around Melbourne
Cup time next year.
There is uncertainty about just what
his name is, who owns him, and his
history, even among his owners and
trainers. But one thing is clear: his
career is not over, whether as a film
star or as something else.
The racing consultant to the film,
champion jockey Roy Higgins, was
quite convinced — and convincing —
when he told me the horse was a former
racehorse. Towering Inferno, that had
been barred from racetracks because he
was a "barrier rogue" that had injured
a number of jockeys by playing up at
the starting gates.
It was common knowledge that the
big fellow's name was Towering
Inferno, probably for the flaming red of
his mane and tail and the rippling fire
of his muscles as he moved in sunshine;
that, and his towering height of
17 hands 1½ — actually half an inch
taller than Phar Lap.
But his trainer in acting skills, the
film's head wrangler, Heath Harris, was
quite certain that he had never raced,
and had had his first experiences on the
racetrack during preparation for filming.
The big red that plays Phar Lap on a beach near Cronulla, in a scene from the film. Seated on the small grey is Tom t^rlinson, who plays Tommy Woodcocj^. Help
The big red that plays Phar Lap on a beach near Cronulla, in a scene from the film. Seated
on the small grey is Tom Burlinson, who plays Tommy Woodcock.
He was very vehement, also, about
the suggestion that he was a rogue of
any kind.
"He's a sweet-natured fellow, highly
intelligent and very biddable," he told
me at Flemington on a recent Saturday.
They were shooting Phar Lap's win in
the 1930 Melbourne Cup and all that
went with it — period-costume crowd
scenes, the champion's dramatic late
arrival at the track, Cup Day excitement
and activity, and the presentation
of the Cup to the jubilant owners.
By JOAN MORRIS
"He's never been a racehorse,"
Heath Harris said. "I bought him from
a property near Walcha, near my own
property where I run and train more
than 200 horses. He's been a show
jumper, and a good one, but not a
racehorse, although he has good racing
breeding on his sire's side and his dam's
side goes right back to Australian
Walers, a famous type used by the
Light Horse Cavalry, and from which
many of the modern Australian Stock
Horses have been bred. Walers is an
abbreviation of New South Walers, the
term applied to the bulk-bought,
station-bred horses from NSW used as
cavalry mounts by Australians during
World War 1.
"He has Derby winners on his sire's
side, and he might yet be the first
showjumper to become a racehorse."
You frequently hear of former
racehorses becoming showjumpers but
never the other way around.
Heath Harris said he intended to take
out a racing-trainer's licence next year
and begin training him for the track.
"He can win. Of course he can win,"
he told me. "He's all heart and he'd love
to race. And he's fast."
Trouble is, the producer of 'Phar
Lap', John Sexton, said the film company
owned the big red horse and would
keep him for at least a year for publicity
purposes during the promotion of the
movie in November next year.
Mr Sexton said also that the film
company had bought about 40 horses to
train as extras, as stand-ins, as the other
horses in the Cup, and as
backgrounders.
"When the film is finished we'll auction
them off," he said. I told him I'd
understood from other film sources that
they were all to be "given to Heath
Harris". No, they'd be auctioned, he
said. Mr Harris could bid for them if
he wanted to.
Heath Harris agreed that they
"belonged" to the film company, but
they were his horses and they had been
"sold" to the film company for the
purposes of insurance only. They would
be automatically his again as soon as
the company no longer needed them.
As to who the big red is, everyone was
certain and hardly anyone agreed. Roy
Higgins had said he was a rogue
racehorse; Heath Harris had said he
The great-hearted steed himself: Phar Lap having a bit of a gallop at Rand wick in the days of his glory. Help
The great-hearted steed himself: Phar Lap having a bit of a gallop at Randwick in the days
of his glory.
was a showjumper, rumour had it that
he had been a racehorse, but not a very
good one; and even the Australian
Jockey Club, in Sydney, gave me a
rundown from a book, saying he'd had
a lot of starts as a 5-year-old, and one
as a 6-year-old, but had not raced since
then.
Deeper delving at the AJC's race
records department, and a talk to one
of the starters, disclosed that there had
been a racehorse called Towering
Inferno that had raced in Sydney. But he
was a stallion, and was listed as a bay
or brown beast. The Towering Inferno
being used in the filming was a chestnut
gelding, never registered as a racer.
The "rogue" came into it, it seems,
with the one regarded as Towering
Inferno's stand-in for the film's racing
scenes, a "big, headstrong fellow"
called Shivers that was banned once
from the Warwick Farm track three or
four years ago for misbehaving at the
start of a race with Malcolm Johnson
on him.
Johnson was not hurt — he jumped
off when Shivers began to play up —
but the horse was automatically banned
until he had trialled again satisfactorily.
He did, raced again, the AJC told me,
and was now retired — into the film
world.
He does the hard-racing scenes, with
jockey Bob Bell on board, while Towering
Inferno, known now as Bobby, does
the close-ups and the acting roles with
Sydney actor James Steele as his
sidekick.
All the horses that have roles in the
film will not become stars, although
their selection was made with as much
care as those of the "names". Roy
Higgins told me they had been carefully
chosen by Heath Harris and Melbourne
horse dealer Frank Ford to do specific
jobs.
"It was important that during the
racing scenes the horses appeared to be
racing, and not being held back or
'pulled'," he said.
"So there was quite a selection process
once we had them, and each was
encouraged to race full out to its best
speed.
"Then we picked them — this one to
run fifth, this one, flat out, to run
eighth. This way we knew that the race
would look genuine, with each horse
running to capacity, and filling the
placings that we wanted them to."
The jockeys in the film are real, too,
with professional riders, former jockeys
and amateurs taking the saddles.
"Some of them have left racing
because of weight problems, but most still
ride trackwork most days," Higgins
said. "The racing in the film will look
as real as possible."
He had spent his term as racing
consultant "teaching the horses to be
champions and the jockeys to be
actors", and felt he had succeeded very
well.
This is not Higgins's first venture into
films, but he said he had enjoyed it
immensely. Heath Harris was blase
about his job, although not about the
film. He said it was the 22nd feature
film he'd been involved with.
"It's a first-class film," he told me.
"It's been crying out to be made for
years, and it's being done very well. It
should sell well in America as well as
here, because America is where Phar
Lap died and they've never forgotten
him."
Heath Harris's work is well-known to
Australian film and television
audiences, although perhaps until now his
name has not been. He has helped make
those cigarette advertisements which
have outdoor scenes filled with strong
men and many horses, galloping up and
down.
Asked about his other films, in particular
'The Man From Snowy River', he
said, "That one was not much, where
I was concerned. Just another Marlboro
ad."
His first movie was 'Born to Trot', a
Disney film, and he said he honestly
couldn't remember all the others. But
he would remember 'Phar Lap'.
Some racing sequences are still to be
filmed and, all told, about a month's
filming to be done before editing can
begin. Some of the filming will be much
nearer home than Flemington
racecourse: in the early part of December
the film crew will be at Adaminaby,
in the Snowy Mountains foothills just
outside the ACT.
For almost a week they will recreating
the famous Agua Caliente race —
Phar Lap's last race, in Mexico.
But most of the racing scenes will be
shot at Caulfield, where the 1983
Melbourne skyline won't intrude. As the
commentator said in explanations to the
crowd in their film finery at Flemington,
"some will be shot at Caulfield,
because it needs the Depression
atmosphere". Presumably Caulfield looks
now the way Flemington did 50 years
ago.
Certainly some of the oldtimers at the
racecourse that Saturday, some of
whom had watched the real Phar Lap
win his Cup, were amazed that
Flemington was being used at all. "None of
the roses were here, then," one of them
told me. "There were just little fences
and the flat — no grandstand, either.
"People just stood about looking from
down here."
But the researchers found there had
been one grandstand, and there were
plenty of shots taken of the crowd
standing and cheering in the stand
during the filming, even if organisers had
to keep moving the crowd from one end
to the other to make it look packed.
The crowd was very willing, that hot
Saturday — another difference from
the big day in 1930. That day it rained
all morning, and in the race before the
Cup, watchers were hard put to see the
runners.
"There ought to be more umbrellas,"
one old punter told me. "There were
thousands of them here that Cup Day.
"I've brought my '30s umbrella with
me," she said, waving at me a brolly
that definitely had seen better days.
"My aunt carried this one the day Phar
Lap won."
Head wrangler Heath Harris: "He's heart and he's love to race". Help
Head wrangler Heath Harris: "He's
heart and he's love to race".
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