The Revenant Riders

When it comes to being stars there are none better than cowboys.

And that goes even when they're rubbing shoulders with the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio.

Innisfail's Ivan Daines recently hung out with his best cowboy pals to play important special skills extra roles in DiCaprio's blockbuster film hit The Revenant.

“It was an honour and lots of work and lots of effort,” said the local hall of fame rodeo legend. However, Daines was quick to add he was never blinded by the movie stars all around him, including DiCaprio.

“It is not the most important thing to see Leonardo. He's a great star but everyone is working,” said Daines. “It's continuous, and you want to be prepared because when they say rehearsal they want you there and going. They don't want you saying, ‘well, give me 10 minutes or half an hour.'”

On Feb. 13 at the Innisfail Auction Mart, Daines got together with a group of cowboy friends to reminisce about their experiences during the filming of The Revenant, which has been nominated for 12 Academy Awards. The awards will be handed out Feb. 28.

They all said it was a go for them to help with the film's shooting last year the moment they got a call from Longview's John Scott, a longtime rodeo friend who has achieved fame as a head wrangler and stunt coordinator for dozens of motion pictures and television series.

“He (Scott) likes to get a big group of rodeo guys. It takes a lot of people to handle those horses, and put all that on,” said Water Valley's Mark Nugent, who was one of Scott's captains to care for the hundreds of animals during the eight months of filming The Revenant in the foothills of the Rockies. “As well organized as John is, and as many movies as he has done, it seemed easy when you are around him. He's got everything so organized and has such a great group of horses.”

Scott has been in the movie business for more than 45 years and to this day he relies on a core group of cowboys, including Daines and Nugent, as special skilled background riders and stuntmen.

“I just hired all my retired cowboy friends because it is very important to be able to get away from a horse,” said Scott, whose resume includes work on the Oscar-winning movies Lord of the Rings, Legends of the Fall, Unforgiven and Days of Heaven. “It is one thing to get on a horse, but when a horse gets into trouble you have to have the skill and knowledge to get away from him so you don't get hurt or hurt other people.

“They don't look at it as a job. They come and do what they naturally do, and they have fun doing it,” added Scott. “If they didn't like horses they wouldn't be there. If they weren't good with horses they wouldn't be there. You're only good as the people you have around you, and I have always hired the best and right people there was to help make it work.”

Two other “best and right” guys were Innisfail's Bob Leggette, a renowned mule expert, and Mel Hyland, a retired two-time world champion saddle bronc rider who hails from High Prairie.

“They were looking for mules to put in the movie so I applied with my mule Jessie, and I told them if they were going to take Jessie they would have to take me to look after Jessie,” said Leggette with a chuckle.

As for Hyland, he was asked to perform a special role as a grizzled old trapper. He was asked to grow a beard for the role.

“I grew it but it was as white as snow. I had to darken it,” he said with a hearty laugh of his own.

And when all was said and done, the cowboys remain proud of the parts they were tasked to do, whether it was just riding along in the background, bringing in the mules, organizing a herd of 100 horses, or just sharing good old cowboy camaraderie by a Rocky Mountain campsite fire.

“You get guys like Mel and Ivan and all the rodeo guys who have been around pressure situations, they know and can spot a wreck before it happens,” said Nugent. “They know how to look after the actors. It was easy. Everybody just did their job.”

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