Spirit Untamed – Straight-To-Video Masquerading as Theatrical

There is literally no reason why a film like Spirit Untamed should exist. The film is purely a marketing play to keep the source property relevant enough to sell merchandise, nothing more. And that level of care shows. That being said, this is definitely not the first time this has ever happened and will definitely not be the last as these properties continue to find an audience across all media in spite of this and this film will surely be no different. A product more befitting of a straight-to-video release, the fact that its a theatrical release is certainly baffling to say the least. However, this fact doesn’t make it a bad film by any means, just one that has more or less been done countless times before in countless other films. Nothing about this film stands out by any means, making for a forgettable albeit quick watch, clocking in at under 90 minutes. In the end, the film still does enough to get by, especially for fans of horses.

Spirit Untamed isn’t even an original film and is essentially a rehash of the Netflix animated series Spirit Riding Free, featuring the same characters and an expanded version of the same story as the series’ first episode. In other words, a young girl named Lucky Prescott (Merced) has her life turned upside down when she is forced to move back to her hometown of Miradero to live with her father Jim (Gyllenhaal) and along the way befriends a wild stallion for whom she would name Spirit. The synergy between Lucky and Spirit is abundantly obvious and the way the story uses this should not come as much of a surprise to anyone who has ever seen any animated children’s film. The story and subsequent lessons are both predictable to a tee and while this is the case for countless films in this genre. The better films can recover from this by at least being fun. Unfortunately, this was not the case here with the film being more on the dull side.

Merely as a means for Lucky to come into her own as a character in the form a quick journey of self-discovery of sorts, the story of Spirit Untamed truly didn’t matter though some audiences, most likely younger ones, are likely to still connect with Lucky and her journey over the course of the film. The problem with that was that it’s not new by any means, relying on tired tropes and derivative story beats therefore it’s hard to find a reason to care for any of it. Despite this, the film is persistent with its use of corny music in order to illicit emotion. Meanwhile for an animated film, the animation was subpar at best which was par for the course and wasn’t even worthy for the big screen let alone home video.

Ultimately, the best part of Spirit Untamed was the voice acting but not for the reasons one may think. While the material was dreadful, the cast put together for this film was admittedly impressive, featuring the likes of Gyllenhaal, Moore, Walton Goggins, Eiza González, and Andre Braugher just to name a few, which just makes the film even more disappointing.

Overall, Spirt Untamed is just another mediocre animated children’s film that is sure to hit the right spot for some audiences but is also one that most audiences will forget shortly after watching it.

still courtesy of Universal Pictures

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.