Guest column by NickerNews marketing director, Emily Thomas Luciano:
What horseperson doesn’t love an inspiring movie that involves horses? And if the stories are true? Even better!
Equine Assisted Therapy and Equine Facilitated Learning have grown exponentially over the past decade. Now, with increasing amounts of research to back up the benefits, EAT and EFL are substantiated treatment methods for behavioral, physical and emotional issues. It’s something that we, as horse owners, have known forever—that horses can help us, heal us, ground us. Horses make and keep us whole. Read the research.
Now, a group of N.C.-based filmmakers will bring the message that horses heal to the big screen to tell the masses. “Unbridled” is feature-length drama based on true stories from Corral, a Cary, N.C.-based healing ranch that pairs rescued horses with troubled girls.
In the film, a therapeutic riding center called Unbridled becomes a healing oasis for Sarah, a teenage victim of prostitution. Though the movie starts out on a bleak tone, the story is one of redemption, triumph, and resilience. It’s a reminder that we can 
all live a fulfilling life in spite of adverse circumstances.
The inspiration for the movie came after Christy McGlothlin, the film’s producer and vice president of Moving Visions Entertainment, visited Corral with her daughter, a Corral volunteer.
“I was pretty much awestruck by what they do,” McGlothlin said “The impact that they have on the girls, the way the girls’ lives had just really changed for the better. When I left, I thought, ‘Wow, if we could capture what they do in a drama, I think it would be extremely inspiring on a couple of fronts.’”
The movie tackles the same difficult issues: abuse, abandonment, sex trafficking, and bulimia, that the real-life staff and mentors at Corral see every day.
Handling such dark issues in a manner suitable for the film’s intended family-based viewing audience presented a challenge, but one that the production team met head-on, motivated by the promise of redemption at the end of the film.
“Unbridled” will have a limited theatrical release nationwide Sept. 9, 2016, followed by a Netflix debut and DVD availability. Click here for more.