Autumn and the Black Jaguar (3½ Stars)

This is a film made by Gilles de Maistre. the director responsible for "Mia and the White Lion". As you can guess, it has the same premise: a young girl is friends with a dangerous animal. I had my doubts whether he would be successful repeating the same formula. I was right. This film isn't as good as the first.

Autumn is a girl who adopted a black jaguar while her family lived in Peru. Her mother was killed by poachers, but it was unable to identify them, so Autumn and her father moved back to New York. Three years later Autumn is told that Hope, the jaguar, is being hunted. Against the wishes of her father she takes a plane to Peru to save her old friend. For reasons unclear to me, her school teacher Anja travels with her. When Autumn and Anja arrive, their lives are in danger from wild animals and murderous poachers.

Compared to "Mia and the White Lion", this film is emotionally flat. We aren't given time to get to know Hope better. There's a lot of propaganda for animal protection, which I totally agree with, but too little care is put into writing a good story. Only the stunningly beautiful scenery has prevented me giving the film an even lower rating.