Award-winning animated feature, a headstrong princess.

Rating: Null/10 (26 February 2013)

The Oscars were just awarded this past weekend and this film, "Brave", won for the best animated feature film. It is a story set in old Scotland, and the young princess Merida is coming of age. It is time to have the allies come with their sons, and a competition is to be staged to see which one wins the hand of the princess.
Kelly Macdonald is a wonderful actress and she voices Merida, who has always had her own thoughts about things in life. While she studied proper manners growing up, what she really enjoyed was jumping on her horse and riding into the forest, and practicing her archery.
Her dad is Billy Connolly as Fergus, infamous bear hunter who lost his left foot and now has a peg, but he also has the bear stuffed in his castle. And Emma Thompson voices hr mother, Elinor.
This is a Disney movie so has a good message embedded. Basically it is that in figuring out our path in life we must not sever the bonds of family in doing so. Merida had done that in an argument with her mother, and in an encounter with a witch tried to mend it with a spell that backfired. But eventually she figures it all out and patches things up.
The story, animation, and voice acting are all first-rate, a nicely entertaining 90 minutes. I really liked how they presented Merida, with bright red-orange curly hair.
SPOILERS: Merida figured how to get out of marrying one of the boys, she got to pick the type of competition and chose archery. Then she jumped into the competition, shooting 3 bulls-eyes, the last one splitting another arrow, to win and choose herself. But the spell turns her mother into a bear, and after some altercations Merida has to apologize to her mother and tell her she loves her to break the spell and get her mother back.