Great Horse Documentaries | Human–Horse Stories in Film
A curated list of the best horse documentaries we love, exploring wild horses, nomadic cultures, conservation, and the human–horse bond.
ICONIC AND BELOVED HORSE DOCUMENTARIES
BUCK
2011 — Director: Cindy Meehl
It’s about listening. American cowboy Buck Brannaman has a unique way of communicating with horses, and it’s exactly this unorthodox style of training that inspired the novel The Horse Whisperer. In this documentary, Cindy Meehl reveals how Buck’s abusive childhood shaped the compassion and insight that define his approach to horsemanship - training horses through respect rather than punishment.
DARK HORSE
2015 — Director: Louise Osmond
The incredible true story of Dream Alliance. A barmaid in a struggling Welsh mining village convinces fellow residents to pool their resources and enter the “sport of kings” with a racehorse they breed and raise themselves. A true underdog horse documentary filled with humor, heart, and collective hope.
Unbranded
2015 — Director: Phillip Baribeau
Four riders. Sixteen mustangs. One thousand miles. Four friends travel on wild mustang horses across the American West, from the Mexican border to Canada. A modern cowboy odyssey that challenges myths about wild horses while exploring endurance, risk, and reinvention.
Looking for More Horse Documentaries?
Explore the films on this site featuring rare horse breeds, nomadic horse cultures, and the enduring relationship between horses, people, and land.
HORSES, CULTURE AND PLACE
FIRE ON THE HILL: THE COWBOYS OF SOUTH CENTRAL LA
2020 — Director: Brett Fallentine
Long before hip-hop and gang culture, South L.A. was home to world-champion African American cowboys. When a mysterious arson attack threatens their legendary stable, “The Hill,” three young men must choose: gang life, or the discipline of the saddle. A gritty, urgent story about identity, survival, and the power of horses to change a future.
INDIAN RELAY
2013 — Director: Charles Dye
One of the most exhilarating and dangerous forms of horse racing in the world, Indian Relay is shown here as a living expression of Native American culture. This immersive documentary foregrounds kinship, tradition, sovereignty, and the high stakes of speed and honor.
SWEETGRASS
2009 — Directors: Lucien Castaing-Taylor & Ilisa Barbash
At the end of a way of life. An observational masterpiece following shepherds, horses, and sheep through a final transhumance in Montana’s Beartooth Mountains. A landmark ethnographic film depicting the demanding relationships between humans, animals, land, and labor.
WILD HORSES AND CONSERVATION
THE WILD HORSE REDEMPTION
2013 — Director: John Zaritsky
At a prison in the high desert foothills of the Colorado Rockies, incarcerated men are given 90 days to train wild mustang horses. This powerful and uncomfortable documentary explores rehabilitation, trust, and transformation for both horses and humans.
RUNNING WILD: THE LIFE OF DAYTON O. HYDE
2013 — Director: Suzanne Mitchell
An 88-year-old cowboy devotes his life to protecting wild horses at his South Dakota sanctuary. A quietly moving portrait of conservation, legacy, and America’s Western heritage.
HORSES, HEALING AND THE HUMAN BOND
THE HORSE BOY
2009 — Director: Michel Orion Scott
A family travels to Mongolia to consult with nomadic shamans in hopes of helping their autistic son. A deeply personal horse documentary exploring autism, sensory experience, and interspecies communication.
BEING WITH ANIMALS
2012 — Director: Salomé Pitschen
A philosophical meditation on human–animal relationships across cultures, including our long partnership with horses. A film that asks what it truly means to be in relationship with another species.
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Why Horses Matter in Documentary Storytelling
A note from Sophie: Horses occupy a singular place in documentary because they sit at the intersection of movement, memory, labor, and longing. They carry history in their bodies, migration routes, trade paths, warfare, agriculture, ceremony. and they remain profoundly present, responsive, and alive to the moment. To film horses is to film relationship: between human and animal, land and culture, tradition and change. Horses do not perform for the camera; they register it. They ask us, as filmmakers to slow down, to listen, and to reckon with forms of knowledge that are embodied rather than spoken. A kind of sacred attention. In this way, horse documentaries often become meditations on how we live with other beings, and what we risk losing when those relationships fray.