Clash of the Wolves

In the High Sierras, Lobo (Rin-tin-tin) rescues his family from a forest fire and escapes with them to the desert. Dave Weston is prospecting for borax. May Barstowe likes the lonely prospector but his wealthy ranch owner father does not. Wolves are attacking and the alarm is sounded. Lobo is injured by the ranchers and Dave takes in the wolf outlaw.

I didn't know much about Rin-tin-tin other than he was one of the first Hollywood dog stars. I didn't know that he was a real dog from WWI who later got work in Hollywood. I actually would like to follow the dog than the humans. The humans are fine, but I kept waiting for Rin-tin-tin on the screen. It's a little sad that he gets domesticated. I didn't get the beard premise until the bad guy recognizes him without it. It's silly and hilarious. It's just so dumb of an idea that it works as comedy. Rin-tin-tin projects smarts and is a real character on his own. I really wish to have more of him.

With good action, a likable animal star, and well-chosen outdoor settings, this is an enjoyable movie to watch. The story is made up of some familiar elements, but it moves at a good pace, and the technique is solid and often impressive.

The plot has Rin Tin Tin as the leader of a pack of wolves trying to survive near a populated area, and it combines his story with that of a prospector (played by Charles Russell) who's trying to win the daughter of a wealthy rancher at the same time as he has to outwit a crafty claim jumper. It's the resulting action scenes that make the movie so entertaining, and that also display some resourceful filming technique. Rin Tin Tin really is the biggest star, and all of the scenes with him and his stand-ins look very realistic, and work quite well. He even has believable reactions to the rather goofy ideas that the prospector and his comic-relief buddy (Charles Conklin) concoct in trying to domesticate him.

There are also lots of other scenes involving groups of animals, and it must have taken a lot of careful planning to make them look so good. At times they capture large-scale action, and at other times the camera is able to capture the speed of its star in motion. Almost all of the story takes place outdoors, and the settings help create the right atmosphere for the story. Overall, this is an entertaining movie with several strengths to it.

We all know it: dogs (or half-breed wolves, as is Lobo - Rin Tin Tin - in the present film), are highly intelligent persons.

Perfectly fit for the hard and sometimes merciless life of the wild, Lobo suddenly changes the rough instinctual habits instilled in him by mother nature when Dave Weston, a young prospector, relieves the dog's pain by removing from his paw a large thorne, like Androcles and the lion. It (I'd rather say: he, the dog) is now tame, and deserts the pack, his mate and the puppies, to become, all in a jiff, the loving pet in Dave's log cabin near the village.

The village's people have always known Lobo and are very aware of the dangers the dog/wolf has ever represented for their cattle and for themselves. It is therefore important to make Lobo unrecognizable, otherwise he will be immediately shot to death. And the device Dave and friends devise for that purpose has something magical, inexplicable and at the same time devoid of all sense: they put on Lobo's snout a fake beard! You heard me: a fake human beard. And it works!

Lobo then, in the course of the movie, performs all and every number that are requested from a canine or wolfish film-star, and something more: understands or even prevents every wish - spoken or unspoken - of his owner, talks with him by body language, takes spectacular leaps of any sort, attacks villains (though never killing them, it will be unproper), and so on, on a series of events none of which appears to be less predictable. Except when Dave, that is left alone, wounded, with no help or horse, in the middle of the desert, is found in the next scene in perfect health in the jolly company of his girlfriend and Lobo.

Rin-Tin-Tin was one of more than a dozen dog heroes who thrilled audiences during the Twenties, but he was definitely the most famous. Warner Brothers showcased his talents with fast paced and cinematic ally competent films like this one. Rin did not do all the work himself, as he had a large number of stand-ins and stunt doubles who are hard to distinguish from him at times.

Rin's co-stars provide good support for him in this tale of a handsome young borax prospector named Dave Weston who must defend not only his claim but his very life from a claim assessor gone bad. Rin is the wolf hybrid everyone wants to shoot... until one day when Dave finds him incapacitated by a cactus thorn and dying slowly of thirst in the desert. His compassion overcomes his desire to kill him for the bounty on his head, and he takes him to his cabin and treats his wound. "Lobo" becomes his constant companion. From there the story sweeps the viewer in and never lets up until the climax.

As of September 2004, Image Entertainment now has CLASH OF THE WOLVES available on DVD as part of a fascinating boxed set of rarities from the first thirty years of cinema, "More Treasures".

A tremendous showcase for the greatest of canine performers. The movie only falls short in the idiotic slapstick by Heinie Conklin. A young Charles Farrell does a decent job as the human lead, and June Marlowe is excellent and very natural as his girl. But it's Rin Tin Tin who steals the show and the hearts of the audience as a half breed wolf dog who learns the ways of civilization.

I have to dispel a couple of misstatements by other reviewers here. According to Susan Orlean's outstanding biography of Rinty, he performed all of his own stunts in this movie, and he was not injured in any way during the production. It was all acting. His master, Lee Duncan, traveled with the dog and gave live presentations in which he had Rinty demonstrate all of the pain takes and other complex actions from the movie on stage, with Duncan standing ten feet away and controlling the dog through hand gestures. He did this to prove that the dog was never in any real pain on screen. Contemporary accounts describe Rinty's performances as uncanny.

In the first Academy Awards presentation, Rinty received the most votes of any actor for best performance, but the Academy decided it would demean the award if it was given to a mere dog, so they gave it to Emil Jannings instead. Bad mistake. There was nothing mere about Rin Tin Tin.