I'm not entirely sure how this movie got to theaters. The screen writing on this was absolutely terrible. I took a class in college on screenwriting and I swear some of this kids in that class wrote a better script than this. The entire movie had no driving action or a clear conflict. Yeah the tiger in the cage is the conflict but it's not gripping whatsoever. The conflict should have been something like the motel owner was planning on killing it and Rob and Sistine wanted to save it. Or the Tiger was visibly sick. Anything would have been better than "feeling bad for it". Also, Sistine's character is very annoying, much rather have had her be another poverty type girl who takes a liking to Rob. Queen Latifah's character fell short as I thought she would have a greater impact. I have absolutely no idea why they let a TIGER out in the woods of FLORIDA. Not only is that a terrible mistake, tigers don't live in Florida woods. And the fact that Queen Latifah didn't intervene and help that get professional help blows my mind. The children actors fall short as well but I blame that entirely on the screen writing. The conflict between the dad and the motel owner literally was not solved at all in the end. They literally just walk away from each other after killing the tiger. The dialogue was way too on the nose. Especially Rob's mother's death. We know she died, you didn't need the doctor to cheesily say "she's passed" like yeah no kidding. Show don't tell goes a long way in screenwriting. Overall, nothing was resolved, the tiger ended up getting shot anyways literally 20 seconds after it was freed. And somehow the drawing Rob made of the tiger magically floated in front of them as they were walking away. I don't care if this was based on a best selling novel, whoever did the screen writing for this ought to be fired. Don't waste your money.
Review of The Tiger Rising
