clanciai Review of The Call of the Wild

The Call of the Wild (1972)

Jack London and Charlton Heston in Norway to increase the struggle

[10/10 · 17 November 2021]

There is no film version of any of Jack London's novels that follows the book meticulously, and that is perhaps more the merit of Jack London than of his film producers, his books inspiring to do something even better than the book, which they often succeed in, and this is the perfect example. Charlton Heston might be somewhat miscast, he didn't like the production himself, but he complied with the film team and agreed to expose himself to arduous physical trials and strains in the wilderness of Norway to at least make the best of it. The main desert of the film is not his part but the fantastic scenery, the marvelous direction capturing the wild mad pioneer spirit of the gold rush in Klondyke and Dawson, with more realistic results than Chaplin's "The Gold Rush", and the overwhelmingly beautiful music by Carlo Rustichelli, which covers the film in poetry. Yes, the story is much altered from London's, it is made more dramatic including some real ruffians and scoundrels, there is no lady in London's tale while here she is even French and quite relevant and convincing, and the question is: is this a film of humans or of dogs? I would say it's a story of friendship, both between humans, even more between humans and dogs but maybe especially between wolves and the dog. The film moves swiftly, many scenes could have been made more of, and much of the most important action is cut rather short. The circumstances could be blamed for that: Norway is even further north than Alaska and its winters longer, harsher, darker and more severe. The only thing lacking in the film is some northern lights.