The Call of the Wild<\/em> will be the first encounter for some viewers (including this one) with the Disney-owned 20th Century Studios – formerly 20th Century Fox – and its awkwardly truncated logo. It feels like an attempt to claim nothing has really changed, that everything\u2019s the same except for the name. If that intro were in front of, say, an X-Men movie, or an Alita: Battle Angel <\/em>sequel, I might believe it. The Call of the Wild<\/em>, however, feels like a very Disney movie, at home on Disney+ next to the likes of Togo<\/em> or Iron Will<\/em>. Its existence lends credence to the idea that one company with dominant ownership over what we see will result in a homogenous market, where releases exude an identical amount of blandness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s probably unfair to put such an ominous label on a weak February release, but it\u2019s hard to shake the feeling that were The Call of the Wild<\/em> produced pre-Fox buyout, Disney\u2019s name would\u2019ve been on the poster. It\u2019s aimed squarely at a family audience, though there\u2019s quite a bit of content \u2013 violence, imminent peril, and the overt implication of animal abuse, to name some \u2013 that feels inappropriate for younger audiences. This is a movie for no one, except perhaps hardcore dog lovers for whom the quantity of animal content trumps the quality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An adaptation of the Jack London novel, The Call of the Wild<\/em> follows Buck, a dog who begins life as the spoiled pet of a judge, then is dognapped and brought to Alaska. Buck becomes part of a team pulling a mail sled, working for a good-natured mailman (Omar Sy), and his wife (Cara Gee). Later, Buck and the other dogs are bought by a cruel rich boy (Dan Stevens) and his wife (Karen Gillan), looking for gold and adventure in the Yukon. Buck is saved by John Thornton (Harrison Ford), a man living in isolation following the death of his son. John and Buck go on an adventure that helps John process his grief, and brings Buck in touch with his ancient, wild animal roots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n Throughout its runtime, The Call of the Wild<\/em> struggles to find a consistent tone, switching between cute animal shenanigans and a perilous setting. Buck and his rotating series of canine friends are animated; Buck is brought to life by choreographer and motion capture performer Terry Notary. The movie\u2019s use of the character is similarly cartoonish \u2013 fitting, since the film\u2019s director, Chris Sanders, comes from an animation background (he got his start at Disney, in case you\u2019re wondering). Buck bounds around every scene he\u2019s in, creating exaggerated imprints on beds, knocking over furniture and upending tables full of food. He\u2019s a character made for kids to enjoy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The world Buck\u2019s placed in, however, requires a more serious approach. His experience in the Yukon involves avalanches, a near-fatal fall through a frozen river, animal cruelty both implied and overt, and murder. At one point, Buck protects Ford by carrying Stevens\u2019 mustache-twirling villain, Hal, into<\/em> a burning building and leaving him there to die. That\u2019s a big swing, considering just moments before, Buck was lifting gold nuggets the size of ostrich eggs out of a river, eager for Ford\u2019s approval. The movie\u2019s moments of kid-friendly humor are frequently followed by harrowing turns, with barely anything to temper the transition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Call of the Wild<\/em> isn\u2019t offensively bad. For all the mixed messages the movie sends, Buck\u2019s expressiveness is sweet, and some of the human characters are sympathetic. However, it\u2019s also not very good, and doesn\u2019t leave an impression beyond a general sense of emotional confusion. While not unusual for a movie released in the middle of a winter dumping ground, it does raise a few questions over what Disney\u2019s plans are for the future of the studio it\u2019s bought. The Call of the Wild<\/em> suggests 20th Century Studios could just become a repository for Disney\u2019s middling family-friendly releases. Hopefully that won\u2019t be the case, but the evidence so far isn\u2019t very promising.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The Call of the Wild” is in theaters Friday.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Call of the Wild will be the first encounter for some viewers (including this one) with the Disney-owned 20th […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":577,"featured_media":13464,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[340,1381],"tags":[1098,162],"class_list":["post-13463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","category-movies","tag-movie-review","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/577"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}C-<\/h1>\n\n\n\n