autoduelist
Member
Just got back from seeing Call of the Wild with my 6 year old son.
Quick review - solid movie, heavily modernized, only mildly woke. Some/most changes were absolutely expected given the target audience and modern 'sensibilities'. Super fun, though.
Before I took my kid to see this, we read the book together. It, alongside White Fang, are classics of my own childhood and I didn't want my kid to only have this version be his first experience. This also let us discuss all the differences after the movie - my son's first words were 'that was nothing like the book'.
This was definitely rewritten in the age of woke, but thankfully, pretty tastefully.
Examples -
- genderswap of Francois to a woman.
- they get rid of the Indian attack at the end and turn the main villain into a rich guy
- thorton finds gold, then says no man should have more gold than he needs to eat and throws it back
- in the bar fight, instead of buck killing the bad guy and being found innocent of murder [by the crowd] due to provocation, here an Indian comes out of the crowd to stop and judge the fight, sees the rich guy has a gun, and rich guy gets thrown out of bar. So instead of it being a commentary on the law of club and fang as it applies to people, it feels like... gun control? Felt odd.
It's all an affront to the original, sure, but quite tame and expected...
Other modern smoothing:
-in the book, Buck sees food stolen by the strong and learns to steal himself to survive... in the movie, he sees food stolen and donates his entire meal to the weak dog
- in the great rabbit hunt.... he releases the rabbit after he catches it
- in the fight with Spitz, when spitz loses he just wanders off rather than being mauled by the mob
-far, far less violence and general wild. In the book, the wild is harsh, deadly, unforgiving... in the movie, it's more just a mildly dangerous adventure, unless buck is there to save you
That said, the movie is playful, fun, and well done. It's a solid family friendly movie. It strips out most everything the book was about, but still retains a fun story and at least gets some of the call of the wild correct.
Recommendation is to do as i did... read the book, watch the film, discuss. And still worth watching with the kiddos even if you have no interest in reading a masterpiece, you heathen.
Quick review - solid movie, heavily modernized, only mildly woke. Some/most changes were absolutely expected given the target audience and modern 'sensibilities'. Super fun, though.
Before I took my kid to see this, we read the book together. It, alongside White Fang, are classics of my own childhood and I didn't want my kid to only have this version be his first experience. This also let us discuss all the differences after the movie - my son's first words were 'that was nothing like the book'.
This was definitely rewritten in the age of woke, but thankfully, pretty tastefully.
Examples -
- genderswap of Francois to a woman.
- they get rid of the Indian attack at the end and turn the main villain into a rich guy
- thorton finds gold, then says no man should have more gold than he needs to eat and throws it back
- in the bar fight, instead of buck killing the bad guy and being found innocent of murder [by the crowd] due to provocation, here an Indian comes out of the crowd to stop and judge the fight, sees the rich guy has a gun, and rich guy gets thrown out of bar. So instead of it being a commentary on the law of club and fang as it applies to people, it feels like... gun control? Felt odd.
It's all an affront to the original, sure, but quite tame and expected...
Other modern smoothing:
-in the book, Buck sees food stolen by the strong and learns to steal himself to survive... in the movie, he sees food stolen and donates his entire meal to the weak dog
- in the great rabbit hunt.... he releases the rabbit after he catches it
- in the fight with Spitz, when spitz loses he just wanders off rather than being mauled by the mob
-far, far less violence and general wild. In the book, the wild is harsh, deadly, unforgiving... in the movie, it's more just a mildly dangerous adventure, unless buck is there to save you
That said, the movie is playful, fun, and well done. It's a solid family friendly movie. It strips out most everything the book was about, but still retains a fun story and at least gets some of the call of the wild correct.
Recommendation is to do as i did... read the book, watch the film, discuss. And still worth watching with the kiddos even if you have no interest in reading a masterpiece, you heathen.
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