Darren Weir charges create a dilemma for Michelle Payne movie Ride Like A Girl

A feel-good movie celebrating Michelle Payne shapes as major collateral damage in the wake of the Darren Weir saga, leaving those associated with it in a quandary as to how to treat his character.

Michelle Payne with brother Stevie and Prince of Penzance. Picture: David Caird

A feel-good movie celebrating one of this country’s finest female sporting moments shapes as major collateral damage in the wake of the Darren Weir saga.

Ride Like a Girl, directed by Rachel Griffiths, tells the heartwarming story of Michelle Payne becoming the first female jockey to win the Melbourne Cup, when she steered Prince of Penzance home in the 2015 edition of the famous race.

With Weir facing a possible career-ending ban, it has left those associated with Ride Like a Girl in a quandary as to how to treat his character.

STABLE STARS ON MOVE AS OWNERS DITCH WEIR

HOW WEIR HIT RACING’S BIG TIME

To get a better understanding, I contacted a well-respected movie reviewer this week for a summation of events.

“You would think it renders the movie toast in its current form. The Darren Weir character played by Sullivan Stapleton has a major role, and should Weir be banned from racing then it makes role just about untenable,” said the reviewer, who asked to remain anonymous.

Jockey Michelle Payne celebrates with brother and strapper Stevie Payne after Prince Of Penzance’s 2015 Melbourne Cup win. Picture: Getty Images

“Plus Stapleton is involved in a US series, making it very hard to bring him back here. Maybe they could change Weir’s character and call him Daisy Williams or whatever to take the focus away from him. The other option is to re-edit radically and reshape the story.

“Either way I can’t see the Weir character playing any meaningful role.

“Storm Boy, with Geoffrey Rush playing a leading part, is a good comparison. They subtracted Rush from most of their marketing for the movie.”

Payne with actor Teresa Palmer on the set of Ride Like A Girl. Picture: Instagram

More recently, disgraced Hollywood superstar Kevin Spacey was written out and replaced by Christopher Plummer in All The Money In The World.

Ride Like a Girl has attracted some big sponsors, including the Victorian Government, Tabcorp and Screen Australia.

And it hasn’t been a cheap movie by Australian standards, believing to have cost more than $15 million.

NO PENNY DREADFUL

In a week where the image of racing took another belting, feel-good stories nevertheless persist, such as that of a country-trainedmare named Penny to Sell.

She isn’t Winx, Makybe Diva, Black Caviar or Sunline but to a group of everyday owners, “Penny” is their little trooper.

Wearing the silks of the Buln Buln Football Club in Gippsland, from where some of her owners hail, Penny has won all around Victoria, including the Gunbower and Dunkeld Cups, her home track of Bendigo, Ballarat and Wangaratta.

More recently she came from last to blitz them at Flemington, prompting trainer Mick Sell and his knockabout owners to sether for the $5 million All Star Mile at Flemington on March 16.

All she requires now are your votes, so call up All Star Mileand vote “one” for Penny.

Craig Robertson returns to scale aboard Penny To Sell after she won the William Thomson Dunkeld Cup in the shadow of the Grampians in November. Picture: Alice Laidlaw