New audience introduced to ‘Call of the Wild’

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Raider Times photo / Courtesy of Walt Disney Studios

Harrison Ford is the human star of “Call of the Wild”.

Arkady Varzhapetian, Raider Times staff

Disney’s newest heartwarming, family movie “The Call of the Wild,” starring Harrison Ford, introduces us to a new Disney character, Buck.

“The Call of the Wild,” based on the novel written by Jack London in 1903, has been turned into at least five movies. In the book, as well as the movie, we follow Buck throughout his journey living as a spoiled dog in California, to a sled dog risking his life in Alaskan mountains.

Buck is a Saint Bernard-German Shepherd mix with a childish and loving heart. Set in the 1890s, during the gold rush, we follow Buck on an adventure of a lifetime!

Any dog lovers would cherish this movie with each other and would agree with me that it was one of Disney’s best films about a dog.

Any dog lovers would cherish this movie with each other and would agree with me that it was one of Disney’s best films about a dog.

The movie started with a narration by Harrison Ford, who also narrated part of the movie in the middle and the end. Buck started his life at a cottage with a wealthy family, where he wasn’t really treated like a pet and often slept outside and was very curious. He was lively and loved to do whatever he had pleased … until one day where he was captured and sent to be a part of a dog sled team and deliver mail. Little did he know how his life had changed.

After fighting his fear of being part a pack, he became the leader of the group and started to be more mature. The owner of the pack, played by French actor Omar Sy, finally had his dreams come true and started to deliver mail on time with Buck. But soon, the pack was overcome by a new way of delivering mail and had to go out of business.

Buck was hopeless and didn’t have an owner, until John Thornton (player by Harrison Ford) took Buck to live with him. Buck had seen John in the beginning of the movie with foreshadowed this moment. They started to bond with each other and started to have a father-son relation (as much as you can, considering that Buck is a dog!).

One day, John Thornton decided to take with him to follow a map that led to gold. They hiked for days and overcame a huge waterfall on a raft, and found a small cabin to live in.

Buck started to explore the area and fell in love with a white Timberwolf that changed Buck’s life. They started to spend day and night with each other and John became as lonely as he was before he met Buck. John decides to move back to the village where they lived and left Buck behind because he thought it was his new home and saw how much he had changed.

This movie reminded me a lot of a Disney app kid exclusive movie “Togo” where an Alaskan dog who is also a sled dog helps deliver life-changing medicine in Alaska.

In my opinion, I would give this movie a 8.5 out of 10 because I believe if the animals had voices like in some of Disney’s other movies, the film would be much better and the dogs could express themselves. Nevertheless, the film featured fantastic views of Alaskan mountains and showed America’s hidden gems.

This movie is for people age 10 and up since it has some violence and animal cruelty, but is rated PG.

–Feb. 27, 2020–