The Call of the Wild venting

***Spoiler Alert***

In 2003, I returned to teaching in public schools.  I was hired to teach English Literature and Math Quest.  Part of the English Literature semester course was the teaching of Jack London's The Call of the Wild.  I did it a little differently than the other teachers (as I seem to always do).  We would listen to parts of the novel using a recording on cassette tapes, stopping when students had questions or when I felt we needed to discuss scenes or at predetermined stops to end the reading for the day.  At one point, I skipped watching the movie in its entirety at the end of the novel to viewing clips of what we read the day before at the beginning of class the next day.  This was helpful as it opened discussion for those who had read, those who were absent, those who had questions, and prepared us for that day's reading.

I saw the newest movie tonight.  It was a cute movie.  It could easily be used in a movie/book comparison.  It will open some good dialogue.  It had direct narration from the novel and followed many of the main points from the novel.  The characters were all there except Francois is a woman in the movie.

What is it that was different?  Any of Buck's hardships -- the brutal loss of Curly, the death of Spitz (not really a hardship), the beating from the man in the red sweater, the loss of the team, even the killing of the bear, the moose -- are gone.  Yes, this movie insinuates these in some cases, but it is very minor and are hidden.  Children can watch the movie and not be scared.  However, it doesn't build the immensity of Buck's growth, his Call to the Wild.  Part of this Call involves Buck's killing of larger and larger animals.  The last is killing man, cutting the last thread to domesticity.  The movie is more civil.

One of the things I asked my students to do when we read the novel was to compare Buck's relationship to all the different owners in the novel:  Judge Miller, the man in the red sweater, Perrault and Francois, the mailman, Hal and Mercedes and her husband, and then John Thornton.  By studying these relationships, the reader comes to understand that Buck never truly loved any human until John Thornton.  As the Call becomes stronger and stronger, only the love for John Thornton pulls him back to domesticity.  When John Thornton is killed and Buck kills the Indians, the reader feels Buck's pain but is spared the hurt of seeing John Thornton dead as he is in the pool of water.  The reader and Buck know he's there, but he is unseen.  Buck is now free to answer the Call.  He fathers many descendants and becomes a legend in the folklore.

The movie does make a good connection between Buck and John Thornton, but it is not as strong as the novel.

Is the movie good?  Yes.  Is it as good as the novel?  No.  Do most people read a novel to the same depth as we studied it?  No.  So is the movie a good replacement for those who don't read the novel?  Uhm, I guess so.