Film Review: The Lost Tiger (2025) - Australia
Reviewed by Andrew Chan (Film Critic Circle of Australia)
I rated it 6.5/10
Rating: ★★★
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Australian director Chantelle Murray’s “The Lost Tiger” arrives on the screen bearing the welcome weight of history: it is Australia’s first animated feature directed by an Indigenous woman. That distinction alone marks it as significant. While its narrative treads familiar ground in the family adventure genre, stumbling occasionally on well-worn tropes, the film ultimately succeeds through its distinctive visual poetry and the resonant cultural heartbeat pulsing beneath its surface. It’s a heartfelt quest that feels both personal and ancestral.
We meet Teo (voiced with earnest charm by Thomas Weatherall), a young thylacine – the iconic, striped Tasmanian tiger – inexplicably adopted and raised by a boisterous mob of wrestling kangaroos. The initial "fish out of water" (or more aptly, "tiger out of pouch") premise delivers the expected, often quite funny, physical comedy as Teo clumsily navigates marsupial life. But Murray quickly steers us towards deeper waters. Teo’s sense of displacement blooms into a profound yearning to understand his origins. His journey, spurred by the need to save a mystical island from the rapacious claws of the developer Quinella Quoll (a deliciously over-the-top Celeste Barber, though constrained by the role's familiarity), becomes the film’s true engine.
Accompanied by the scene-stealing Plato, a neurotic platypus voiced with impeccable comedic timing by Rhys Darby, Teo’s odyssey across the Australian bush transcends a simple eco-adventure. It subtly, powerfully, transforms into a poignant metaphor for Indigenous displacement and the vital stewardship of land and heritage. This underlying current gives “The Lost Tiger” its soul, even when the surface plot mechanics feel a touch predictable.
Visually, the film is a revelation. Eschewing the hyper-polished, 24-frames-per-second fluidity of its Hollywood counterparts, the animation house Like A Photon Creative employs a "stepped keys" technique, animating at 12 frames per second. The result is nothing short of magical. It imbues the film with a tactile, almost stop-motion texture. Sunlight dapples through eucalyptus leaves in visible strokes, fur ripples with a tangible weight, and the vastness of the Australian landscape feels weathered, alive, and deeply textured. This aesthetic choice isn't mere gimmickry; it grounds the fantasy in a palpable, earthy reality that perfectly complements the film’s themes. You feel the grit of the soil, the rustle of the dry grass.
Where the film falters, justifying its middle-ground rating, is in its pacing and occasional tonal uncertainty. Quinella Quoll, while entertainingly villainous, remains firmly entrenched in the "greedy developer" archetype, lacking the nuance granted to Teo’s internal struggle. Some comedic beats, clearly aimed at the youngest viewers, land with a thud, momentarily undercutting the gravity of the film's exploration of colonization and cultural erosion. The script, heartfelt in its intentions, sometimes struggles to fully weave its deeper themes seamlessly into the adventure framework.
Yet, the significance of “The Lost Tiger” cannot be overstated. It represents a vital step forward for Australian animation, showcasing a unique visual language and, crucially, an authentic Indigenous perspective rarely seen in mainstream animated features. It may not reinvent the wheel of the hero's journey or the family quest, but its soulfulness, born from its cultural roots and expressed through its stunning, tactile animation, lingers long after the credits roll. It possesses a charm and a distinct identity that many glossier, higher-budget productions lack. It earns its place on the big screen, inviting audiences into a world that feels both fantastical and deeply, authentically real. (Neo, 2026)