The main problem is just that there isn’t much for the actors to work with. There’s isn’t any real energy flowing through this script and the pacing slows it down even more. To top it off, it never feels like the storylines lead us anywhere significant.

The primary line is that of Walter (Osment), who is dropped off by his lowlife mother (Kyra Sedgwick) at her uncle’s farm, where her two single uncles, Garth (Caine) and Hub (Duvall) sit on the deck and shoot stuff. Walter doesn’t want to be there and the two childless brothers don’t know what to do with him. By the end, though, they don’t want to be apart from each other. Touching, but never really moving.

One sub storyline deals with the fact that the brothers are believed to have millions of dollars in cash hidden away and everyone they know, including Walter’s mother, is trying to get in on it. Though the money issue is eventually resolved, it’s not in a way that justifies all the time spent on the matter.

Another storyline entails primarily flashbacks as Garth tells Walter about the adventures that he and Hub would have in Africa. Part of the story involves a woman who Hub married, but is no longer with. Again, the mystery behind the woman and the African adventures are eventually brought to light, but hardly lead to anything noteworthy.

The only thing that Secondhand Lions does manage to tell us is, as someone mentions in reference to Garth and Hub at the end of the film, “These guys really lived.” In a sort of metaphorical foreshadowing of their own lives, Garth and Hub buy and old lion that eventually dies but goes out fighting. A nice thought. But it’s never told in an affecting way. It’s unfortunate, because this is a story that could have been good were it better written – it certainly would have been well acted.

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