The camp, led by head wrangler Rusty Hendrickson, introduced the actors to the horses they’d be riding, and established an overall comfort level with the animals. “Whether it was teaching them how to twirl a rope, get on and off a horse properly, or any other related nuance, the goal was to make sure the actors would be able to sell it on film,” explains Hendrickson. Though everyone’s aptitude around horses was different, the wrangler maintains “sometimes it’s easier to teach someone who’s sponging in the information, than someone who already knows everything. They just hear more.”

As the actor who’d be spending the most screen time on or around horses, Alison Lohman had the most to learn. “You can’t act like you can ride – you can either ride or you can’t,” asserts Hendrickson. “So the first piece of business was getting Alison in the saddle. We had to bring her along fairly quickly, but we were all surprised and impressed with how well she did.”

Says Lohman: “With riding a horse, I think it’s just a matter of doing it, of just practicing and being with the horses, touching them, spending time with them. It was daunting and painful at first, but after weeks of training, it eventually started coming together. I was really proud of what I was able to accomplish in a relatively short time.”

Lohman wanted to connect with the horses emotionally. Recalls Hendrickson, “Alison wanted to know what a horse needs and what she should expect in return. She was as hard-working about the relationship as she was with the riding.”

Maria Bello, who also had little experience with horses, approached her training from a different perspective. “I’d always been attracted to horses, but also sort of afraid of them,” she admits. “But after about my third lesson on Belle, the paint mare I ride, I suddenly understood what it meant to find your seat, to become one with the animal. It started to become a very Zen experience for me, this balance of control and surrender, which I look for often in my real daily life.”

It was a crash course for director Mayer as well, who spent a lot of time preparing with Rusty Hendrickson as well as with the second unit director. “We talked about what horses can really do and what they can’t do,” remembers Mayer. “One of the funniest moments was when I asked if we couldn’t make one of the horses ‘just look’ at Flicka. The answer was ‘Michael, it’s a horse, not an actor.’ I quickly learned that horses aren’t performers, but rather really beautiful, intuitive animals. The last thing they were going to care about is where I want them to look when I yell ‘action!’”

Tim McGraw, on the other hand, grew up riding horses in his native Louisiana, but curtailed his riding once he moved to Nashville to pursue a music career. “It all came back to me once I started working with the wranglers,” affirms McGraw, “but I definitely had a lot of technical questions.”

Continue: 1 2 3 4 5