What Should I Watch after The Call of the Wild?

Anyone who owns a dog knows that they are the most loyal of friends. They come and sit with us in silence while we grieve loss, trying to console our pain with their love. During times of celebration they are an extension of our happiness and excitation, wagging their tails and running around. Most of all, our dogs just love being with us. For them, the best gift, is the gift of our time.

In 2020, The Call of the Wild, was released. This is a movie based on the book written by Jake London. In this movie, set in the early 1900s, we see the journey of a dog named Buck. Buck is dramatically uprooted from his family, and begins a journey that brings him to a railroad town.

Spoiler warning: if you haven’t seen the movie, I am not going to get into too many of the details, but I will discuss the ending. The general theme over the course of this movie is Buck’s transition from domestic dog, to wild animal. During Buck’s journey, we see him pull sleds to deliver mail, and save people when they fall through the ice. Later, we see him find an unlikely friendship in a man who is searching for gold.

The pair sets off into the wilderness to search for the gold, and it is during this time where Buck finds that he enjoys the wild more and more. He forges a place with a pack of wolves, and they explore and have adventures in the outdoors together. In a tragic twist, Buck’s gold searching partner ends up dying. I won’t go into the specific of how, just to keep the suspense alive for when you watch this movie yourself. His remains stay up in the mountains, near a cabin he had been staying in with Buck, while they searched for gold. The movie ends with Buck joining the pack of wolves, but going to visit his human’s final resting place on a regular basis.

The depiction of canine loyalty in this movie can invoke so many emotions in the viewers, especially those who have a loyal canine companion. Buck puts his life on the line several times, for the humans with whom he had formed strong bonds. In these actions, you can see the strong connection he has to his human counterparts. Viewers who have dogs can likely personally attest to similar connections with their own beloved pets, and be particularly moved by what they saw played out in the movie. It shows that the bond between dog and human has been around for a long time.

If you enjoyed The Call of the Wild, then I would recommend watching Hachie: A Dog’s Tail. In 2009, Hachie: A Dog’s Tail, was released. As a viewer I was able to draw many similarities between this movie and The Call of the Wild. In Hachie: A Dog’s Tail, a college professor and his wife adopt a dog, Hachie. Hachie joins a family, and forms a strong connection with one of his owners, a college professor. Everyday, Hachie would run to the train station everyday to wait for the professor when he got home from work. Another spoiler warning: One day, the professor has a medical emergency and dies. To the great sadness of the viewers, Hachie continues to go to the train station to wait for the professor everyday for the rest of his life.

Both of these movies show the true connection between dog and human. We see that even death cannot break this bond. It is the return of the dogs to the last place they saw their favourite humans that invokes so much emotion from the viewers. Dogs are forever loyal if they have a strong connection with you. Another similarity between these movies is that the focus is on the dogs journey, the dogs emotional suffering, rather than the people.

As a dog owner, both movies made me cry and I expect that they may also make you cry, but these were tears are well worth it to see these beautiful stories of the dog and human connection told.