Let’s face it. I’m torn. I’m torn between my feelings while I watched this movie, and the whole tone of this so-called family entertainment. Don’t get me wrong. I like this movie. Not only because I like Mr. Ford, and how he made interactions with CGI-animated animals feels so real, but also because the whole story is fully stuffed with message that I know, would be super beneficial for its young targeted audience. Mr. Ford has track records in interacting with several animated creatures, from low-tech Jabba The Hut from his earlier Star Wars releases, until this high-tech CGI canine friend in The Call in the Wild, and he made us bought it. However, it is how the CGI captures all the effects of a St.Bernard-Collie mix-raced dog and all of his animals companion that amazed me a lot. There would be so many works done to captures all the muscle, fur, weight, angle from dogs to create such realistic looks, although it ends up looking a bit artificial.
The Call of the Wild tells us the story of a dog named Buck. At the first, Buck is a spoiled dog of Judge Miller (Bradley Whitford), before he messed up with the judge’s occasion and he is forced to sleep on the porch. He is kidnapped, and taken to Yukon to be one of transporting dog. He is sold to Perrault (Omar Sy) and his assistant Francoise (Cara Gee), and taken to become carrier postal dog. In simple way, Buck is succeed to become Perrault’s main dog, and made him deliver all the mails on time, something that he has never done before. Unfortunately, the postal service is closed, and Perrault is forced to sell all of his dogs. Buck and his peck are then sold to an arrogant wealthy man named Hal (Dan Stevens), who wants to mine all the golds in Klondike. Hal is vicious and he forced all dogs to work until exhausting, while Buck is finally saved by John Thornton (Harrison Ford), where he finally find his true meaning of friendship. Later, Buck learns that he belongs to the wild, where he can be the true master of his own.
The technology is cool, Mr. Ford is dignified in his role, but the story is where the problem belongs. I can’t even understand why this movie is categorized in family entertainment, while surely it’s too dark for young children and too artificial for older generation. The tone is unbalanced, although the spirit of the story might send a super important message to young children that, no matter how hard, you must fight for the place in your life where you can find the definition of home.
This is where the message gets me a lot. Before I watched the movie, I went into arguments with my boyfriend, the only living person on earth that I could currently define as home. When I watched this movie, watched how Buck struggles to find his place where he belongs, I went into one conclusion: that maybe that place that you belong is there within you. Seventy percent running time of this movie tells us about how Buck struggles from one master to another, some ends with bitterness, like when he’s with Judge Miller (Bradley Whitford), or with Hal (Dan Stevens), where some else ends with true friend, in the form of Perrault (Omar Sy) and his assistant Francoise (Cara Gee) and also in John Thornton (Harrison Ford). That’s life. Everyone lives in their own favour, some favours were in line with yours, and the others were against yours. At the end, only your favour would matter to your own life, and that’s why you must become master of your own.
The message works for me, but indeed, for any younger generation, it’s nowhere to get so clear without the assistance of older guidance. Then again, the whole story becomes unrealistic if it would categorised as family entertainment.
Directed by: Chris Sanders | Produced by: Erwin Stoff | Screenplay by: Michael Green | Starring: Harrison Ford, Dan Stevens, Karen Gillan, Omar Sy, Bradley Whitford | Music by: John Powell | Cinematography: Janusz Kaminski | Edited by: William Hoy, David Heinz | Production Companies: 20th Century Studios, 3Arts Entertainment | Distributed by: 20th Century Studios | Official Website
7.8/10
The Lady in Pink 