By Katey Rich
John and Brad Hennegan know horses. They grew up working at Long Island's Belmont racetrack, scooping ice cream and scooping poop for patrons, jockeys, trainers and horses, with their father involved in the racing community as well. So when they set out to make The First Saturday in May, a documentary about the long road to the Kentucky Derby, they knew that the traditional film crews, boom mics and dolly tracks were out of the question. That left them working with the simplest film crew there is: each other.
"Well, you're looking at the camera crews right now," Brad Hennegan told me when I spoke to him and his brother a week before the film was released last Friday. "What allowed us to get so up close and personal is that the camera was so small," John adds. "These are young animals, and if you had a boom and a director and sound guy, etc., it's too many people to be around. We knew our way around horses, and the trainers felt really comfortable letting us be around."
It's that comfort that makes The First Saturday in May the tender and thrilling movie that it is--unscripted, unplanned moments with some of the country's finest horses, and the trainers and grooms who love them. The trainers featured range from seasoned equestrian experts, like Barbaro trainer Michael Matz, to scrappy up-and-comers getting their first shot at a Derby contender, like New Yorker Frank Amonte. The Hennegans even ventured to Dubai, where American Kiaran McLaughlin trains horses for the royal family of the country. "We wanted to show the international appeal of horse racing," explains John, who says that racing is as popular worldwide today as it used to be in the United States. "Kieran was going there for the Dubai world cup, and we wanted to go with him. We want to show the coolest, most interesting things we can."
Of course, one of the most interesting stories to ever come out of the Derby, and one that gripped the nation for over a year, happened to take place in the year the Hennegans shot their film. Barbaro, the Florida-trained horse who was a favorite going into the Derby, won the race by the widest margin in 60 years. Going into the Preakness Stakes two weeks later, Barbaro was a heavy favorite to be the first Triple Crown winner in nearly 30 years. But Barbaro shattered his leg early in the race, and during the following year's worth of surgeries that attempted to save his life, animal lovers across the world tracked every bit of news about the thoroughbred. As John Hennegan points out, Barbaro was the second-most Googled athlete of 2006, behind only Michael Jordan.
Barbaro's story meant that, despite the title, the movie would not end on Derby day-- the first Saturday in May. "It would be a disservice to the story not to continue on," Brad says. "There had to be an end to the story." John returned to the stable where Barbaro was recovering several times, and filmed the horse only a week before he was put down. Following the media frenzy that surrounded Barbaro, John says, "We had several people approach us and say, 'Why aren't you making the whole film about him?' We just thought that would do a disservice to that whole time. There were so many great stories, and Barbaro's story was one of them." In the final version Barbaro is merely one of six horses who are featured, albeit the only one with global name recognition.
John says people have been attracted to the film because of Barbaro, "But we also want people to know it's fun. There's a lot of laughter, there's a lot about families and stuff that everybody can relate to. People are shocked at how much they like it."
The First Saturday in May is being released by Truly Indie, an arm of Magnolia Pictures that secures theatre engagements and helps with publicity for films that would otherwise be too small to be picked up for distribution. Still, the Hennegans have gone directly to racing fans and movie fans alike to promote the movie-- "You're looking at the marketing department right here," John says. "There's just not the manpower out there for little films like this to go pass out merchandise and postcards. We're going directly to the fans. We're just hoping we can catch fire."
John echoes the fears of many independent filmmakers when he says, "If these little movies like ours don't do well in a theatre now, in the first weekend, they're gone. It's an extremely, extremely competitive market out there." Though similar movies like Spellbound and Mad Hot Ballroom have broken out into the mainstream, it's too soon to tell if First Saturday in May can pull off the same feat. In its opening weekend it averaged $2,727 per theatre, on par with the average of fellow new doc Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed and besting that of Where in the World is Osama bin Laden?, Morgan Spurlock's highly anticipated follow-up to Super Size Me.
It's tempting to use racing metaphors here about breaking out of the pack or making it to the finish line, but The First Saturday in May isn't really like any of the horses it features-- it's a scrappy upstart that's far more of an underdog than Barbaro, Sharp Humor, Brother Derek, Jazil, Achilles of Troy or Lawyer Ron. If you don't recognize those names, see the movie and you will, and maybe start learning some other thoroughbreds to boot. As Brad says, "We have people coming up to us after the screening and saying, 'I hate you guys because now I have to go to the Derby, and it's going to cost me a lot of money to get down there.' "
Read Lewis Beale's review of The First Saturday in May here.
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