“This Is a Healing Place”: Exclusive Clip from ‘Running Wild: The Life of Dayton O. Hyde’ Will Make You Cry
Though we may be willing to accept that not all people are “animal people,” it should prove pretty hard for anyone who watches our exclusive clip from Suzanne Mitchell’s upcoming release Running Wild: The Life of Dayton O. Hyde to not walk away without getting just a little teary. After all, the clip doesn’t just feature rescued horses running free in a sanctuary, it also include a mess of humans speaking quite plainly about the healing powers of those horses – horses they’ve actually saved. There’s clearly a lot of dirt in the air, because I’ve got something in my eye right now.
Filmed over the course of eleven years, Mitchell’s film follows Hyde, billed as “a modern-day renaissance man and one of the last old-style cowboys.” Hyde has dedicated his life to preserving the American West, including the majestic four-legged beasts that helped settle it. As the manager of South Dakota’s Black Hills Wild Horse Sanctuary, Hyde and his team have helped rescue and give a home to hundreds of wild mustangs that have been saved from the many wild horse roundups that still take place across many parts of the country. While the roundups are meant to give homes to wild mustangs, they’ve long been the subject of controversy and intense animal advocate scrutiny, as it’s been reported that a number of roundups have resulted in wild mustangs being gathered up not by eager new owners, but slaughterhouses. Are you crying yet?
In just over one minute, Mitchell introduces us to “The Sanctuary,” along with some of the people, horses, and philosophies that run it. It’s a very moving little slice of the film, and it seems fair to assume that the rest of the production will fall in line with the level of affection and emotion that Mitchell captures here. Get out your hankies (we’re going full cowboy here) and give it a look.
Emotions running, you know, wild.
Running Wild: The Life of Dayton O. Hyde is in limited theaters tomorrow, October 4th.