Film

Tagline: Simple story of a boy... a girl... and a horse

National Velvet, set during the second world war, follows Velvet (played by a 12-year-old Elizabeth Taylor), a girl with a passion for horses who wins spirited steed Pirate in a lottery. Velvet lavishes much love on the horse and, together with a vagrant former jockey named Mi Taylor, she begins to train for the Grand National.

Known for invoking sentiment and happy feelings, the feel-good film's excellence is Velvet’s single-minded determination, supported by her mother (Anne Revere, in an Oscar-winning role), as she fights to be taken seriously despite her age and gender.