User reviews

This is something a bit different to all the animated movies out there. It has a more grown up plot and storyline and is quite rough and tumble, navigating some pretty heavy stuff for the younger audience like kidnapping, killing, and that's the sort of language used. It isn't trying to be Minions where everyone is made of rubber and can fly through walls, it tries to get you invested in a real tale of life or death heroics.

That said, it fails to achieve that in the first half. The pacing felt way off in the first half, parts which should grab you fall flat, feel rushed or incoherent in the editing. The cinematography in these scenes had the same feeling, as did the expressions of the characters. Everything falls a little flat early on and the indifference in the cinema when we saw it was palpable in the early stages. I suspect a lot of footage was cut or quickly edited to reduce the runtime, and it felt like they picked the wrong stuff to cut. It was a shame because the movie really delivers in the second half.

Once they reach the scenes set in the mine, things changed. Everything improved. The pacing, the cinematography and the characters came to life.

All in all, a good family movie, well worth a watch. Don't give up on it in the first half, things begin to flow much better as it progresses.

"Mary" and "Tom" arrive in New York from Ireland only to find that their uncle "Niall" isn't there to meet them. Indeed, the only acquaintance they do make make hanging around the docks is a small dog that she takes a bit of a shine to and names "Sparky". Concluding that he isn't likely to show up, they decide to take a punt and go to California and find him. Problem? Well the trains don't take punts - only dollars, so they have just an hour to raise the fare. Or... Well maybe they could just blend in with a group of travelling children and blag their way onto the train. It turns out that these kids are orphans too, being relocated to kindly families along the route. Except, perhaps, for the paralysed and wheelchair-bound "Nick" who isn't exactly top of anyone's adoption list. Between playing games with their new friends and avoiding the ticket inspector, they gradually make progress until disaster strikes. Disaster that puts them into the clutch of the deadly Cheyenne before befalling some even more ruthless bandits whose leader looks a lot like Lee Van Cleef, and who run a gold mine populated by slave labour. How to rescue themselves, their fellow miners, "Sparky", "Nick" and still find uncle "Niall" - well that's the fun part in this quickly paced and engaging big-eyed animation. It combines the intrepidness of the pioneering spirit with some good old fashioned wild west adventure scenarios and provides us with a little bit of "Temple of Doom" (1984) into the bargain. Apparently it's based on some real-life sibling experiences and readily passes ninety minutes raising the odd smile as we travel the breadth of a vast and untapped wilderness looking for a needle in a very large haystack.

Loved this movie!

Great to see representation for a disabled child, which resonated deeply with me as I work with disabled kids.

My 5-year-old also enjoyed it.

The plot isn't too deep, but it's one of my favorite animations in a while-heartfelt and entertaining. Some scenes, like those with wolves and guns, were a bit scary for my daughter but not overly so.

She loved the characters, especially Sparky the dog, who was a delightful addition.

A touching, inclusive story that made me teary-eyed in the best way.

One of the best animations I've seen in a while. Agree with the other comment, much better than any recent Disney movie I've watched.

Giving this an 8/10 rating

This film is Super fun and charming, just like "DragonKeeper' try and watch the original language version or catch the UK English dub with voices of Alisha Weir, Gemma Arterton, Sean Bean and Stephen Graham and the rest, as the do a bang up top job of it.

Not a boring moment in this film, with so much adventure going on, it packed to the rail road with action and laughs, and the kids are just great, and the look and character designs just simply work, a real wacky Lee Van Cliff looking one here too.

From start to finish, you will be finding joy and it does not mess about either, no preachy message here, just some quite wacky stunts, mostly from the wheelchair action, even the villains are well likeable and done well. Do not miss this film, I am going to see this again. Spanish animated films are doing really good things and have been for the past years now, Warner Bros have got into a good thing with these collaborations, and are up there with Disney, Dreamworks and Illumination, this film really needs to be a hit and we can see a lot more good cinema like this.

Go see this film and support good animation and good films.