Kayla*: A Cry in the Wilderness (A
wild dog tames a young boy’s loneliness and pain) (ONE-ACTION Canada Questar DVD,
$8.65, 2000, 96 minutes, rated NR)
In a Nutshell
The year
was 1920, the year after the flu epidemic. It was winter in northern Quebec and
a young boy moves to the country with his mother newly married to a country
doctor after her husband, son of a famous explorer named MacKenzie disappeared in the wilderness
several years previously.
A pack of
dogs roams the countryside, taking farm animals – sheep and calves. Against the
doctor’s advice, the township sets out strychnine to rid them of this problem.
The boy
believes his father is still alive and also believes one of the pack dogs is
his father’s lead sled dog, Kayla. It is also tough to suddenly have a new
stepfather who is very different. . . .
The Boy who Talks to Dogs, Carpenter
Hands, and . . .
. . . love
and hate and skis and snowshoes and plenty of shouting in anger and threats of
boarding school in Montreal and a sled dog race with no rules and a girl friend
who makes dog sleds and a boy forced to grow up.
Pre-View Perhaps
Parts of Kayla can be a bit uncomfortable for
children to view (like many animal stories) but all the way through, they will
cheer as Sam the boy shows he is smarter than the adults (and, isn’t that what
makes family movies great?)
Lessons Learned
What does
it take for adults to learn the lessons that children already know? What is a
father? When does one let go of a dream? What makes a family?
A study in
history reveals itself in the automobiles and the songs children may not know
but grandparents will sing along with.
Nice Family!
*Kayla can be found in some libraries and
also on Amazon. The movie is adapted from Three Dog Winter. Notice the
harnesses on the sled dogs: they are back attach harness which encourage the
dogs to pull, unlike front-attach harnesses (like the Easy Walk), which help
prevent pulling in family dogs nowadays.
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