The Call of the Wild – A Good “Dog”Story
4 out of 5 Stars
By Joe
The Call of the Wild is a very good movie that I think kids will really enjoy. The film stars Harrison Ford and Buck the “dog.” It is a well told story, with great scenes from the Yukon, that adults will appreciate more than a lot of movies made primarily for the kids. It is based on the Jack London novel about the gold rush in that northern area at the very end of the 18th century. It not the first time a film about that classic book has been made, but Harrison holds his own against earlier versions done by Charleston Heston and Clark Gable. The danger and violence of the original London novel, however, have been eased to accommodate a younger audience. Oh, and in the final paragraph below, I’ll explain why I keep using “dog” this way.
The movie opens in California where Buck, a huge St. Bernard/Scotch Collie mix, lives with a well-off family but is not particularly well-disciplined. After too much bad behavior, Buck is banned from the house to sleep in the yard. He is dog-napped, loaded on a train, and shipped to the Yukon where dogs who can help gold rush prospectors transport equipment and cargo through the snow go for good money. Buck growls at his first handler, who hits him with a club. The scene is carefully done not to be too violent and convinces Buck that he is in a new world.
Buck is sold to a French couple who manage a mail delivery service through the area using a dog sled. He learns what it means to be part of a pack and how to move the sled. Buck helps save the French female from drowning and, when the current lead dog becomes a problem, Buck takes over the team. His strength helps the team finally make mail deadlines. Life is good until the mail delivery service is replaced with a telegraph and Buck, once again, is up for sale.
Buck’s new master is Hal, a rich man who wants to get richer. He buys the team to haul him and his wife on a hunt to find gold on an overloaded sled that includes a gramophone and several cases of champagne. It is quickly clear that Hal knows nothing about commonsense and kindness and pushes his sled past their limits, lashing the dogs for being tired. Fortunately for Buck, the team has come to the attention of John Thorton (Harrison Ford at last) who realizes that Hal will not be good for the team and follows them. John rescues an abused Buck from Hal, who is enraged by the action, and brings the dog with him as he searches for and finds a lost cabin which is located on a river rich with gold deposits.
As Buck and John become close friends, we learn that John lost his young son a few years ago, left his family due to grief, and came to the Yukon which his son loved reading about. During Buck’s recovery from Hal’s abuse, he becomes concerned about John’s drinking to offset his sorrow and dumps one of the bottles of booze out. John hides his other bottle but stops drinking as much. As they live in the cabin, Buck is drawn to the wolf pack living in the area and finds a girlfriend. Although he is pulled more toward these animals, he still returns to the cabin to reconnect with his human friend John. Things turn bad, however, when Hal finds the cabin. The conflict that follows results in both men dying. The story ends with Buck joining the pack and the resultant puppies from Buck and his mate become famous in the area for their size and intelligence.
To close, lets finally address my use of “dog” above. If you haven’t read about it already, the dogs in The Call of the Wild are all the result of computer-generated graphic images (CGI) and were not alive. A human, an acrobat from Cirque du Soleil, was used in place of Buck in most scenes to give Harrison and others a character to relate to, and to help with movement and spacing. This has created a stir among many reviewers for this movie. Some panned the effort. Personally, I was surprised and pleased with the results that so closely resembled a real dog. Except for maybe 2-3 small instances, the cartoon character of Buck rang true for me and I enjoyed what the CGI technicians were able to accomplish here. Besides this being a good movie, you may want to see it to see what you think about the results of this this effort. I suspect we may well be seeing larger roles for CGI efforts in future movies.