Thornton (Harrison Ford) and Buck bond over their daily activities, primarily fishing and gold panning.
CALL OF THE WILD
Film Review by Marlene Ardoin
A lot of the brutal details of Jack London’s 1903 novel on the Klondike Gold Rush involving a mongrel dog have been softened for this film.
London wrote this novel, which is one of his most popular, while married to his first wife, Elizabeth Maddern.
An interesting fact is that this novel was banned in Yugoslavia and Italy for being “too radical” and was burned by the Nazis because of the author’s well-known socialist leanings.
London was also an animal activist and it shows in this story.
In “Call of the Wild”, London makes the dog, Buck, the hero of the story, in which London is very descriptive about how animals are abused by humankind.
In fact, the way dog labor is exploited in this story, is very similar to how Black labor was exploited during that time.
When London was growing up, he had a foster parent, Virginia Prentiss, an African-American woman and former slave, who was a major maternal figure throughout London’s life.
London was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth, but for controversy sake, the dog in his novel is.
Buck is very much spoiled by the local judge and family, before being transported to the hard knocks life in the Klondike.
In this film, Buck defeats the lead husky, Spitz, in a dominance fight, who then just limps off, but in London’s novel, this was a fight to the death.
Not all the humans are cruel or exploitive in the story, but many are.
London was very much for the underdogs.
This film gives African-Americans and Native Americans positive roles to play.
I prefer this film’s ending to the novel’s ending, which really points out how times have changed.
I love stories that leave you thinking about them in positive and evolving ways.
After seeing the film, “Call of the Wild,” I invite you to try reading the novel, or vice versa.
Buck’s speed and strength allow the sled to arrive to deposit the mail on time.
Cast[edit]
- Harrison Ford as John Thornton
- Omar Sy as Perrault
- Dan Stevens as Hal
- Karen Gillan as Mercedes
- Bradley Whitford as Judge Miller
- Colin Woodell as Charles
- Cara Gee as Françoise
- Scott MacDonald as Dawson
- Actor and stunt coordinator Terry Notary stood-in for the CGI creation of Buck, whose model was scanned after an adopted dog.
“Call of the Wild,” film:
https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/call/full-text/chapter-vii/
Jack London’s “Call of the Wild” summary of :
https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/call/summary/
Jack London
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_London
“Call of the Wild” Novel versus Film:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Call_of_the_Wild
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Call_of_the_Wild_(2020_film)
Jack London
| Born | John Griffith Chaney January 12, 1876 San Francisco, California, U.S. |
| Died | November 22, 1916 (aged 40) Glen Ellen, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Novelist, journalist, short story writer and essayist |
| Literary movement | Realism, Naturalism |
| Spouse | Elizabeth Maddern (m. 1900; div. 1904)Charmian Kittredge (m. 1905) |
3/11/2020 # Call of the Wild