Running Free

Chase Moore and Arie Verveen are the human stars of this period drama about the extraordinary life and times of a horse. In 1914, a German supply ship is en route to Africa with a cargo of work horses when one of the mares gives birth to a foal. The pony is soon separated from his mother when the ship docks in a mining community, and he has a hard time getting along, but an orphaned boy who works at a stable takes a liking to the little horse and looks after him. When war breaks out, the stable is abandoned and the pony escapes into a nearby desert, where an Oryx antelope and a native girl become his companions and teach him how to survive on his own. Running Free was directed by award-winning Russian filmmaker Sergei Bodrov; it was produced by Jean-Jacques Annaud, who displayed a flair for unusual stories about animals with The Bear.