Wild America

When I heard that Jonathan Taylor Thomas was doing a movie with Devon Sawa at the height of my teenybopper stage, needless to say I was excited. The weird thing is that I still love this movie now. The plot follows the three Stouffer brothers, Marty, Mark, and Marshall, following their dreams to get out of their small town and dead-end future as mechanics and go out and film animals. Not just any animals, though, the "biggest bad-a**es of the animal kingdom," which results in a few thrilling, sometimes comic adventures for the three brothers. The brothers want the piece de resistance of their film to be an infamous cave where a group of bears are reputed to sleep together, the rumor that actually starts their trip and leads to the biggest adventure of all. This movie is full of hope that dreams can come true, as cheesy as that sounds, and is even better as it is a true story based on the naturalists behind Wild America. Great shots of animals, as well (not counting fake bear suits).

Although this is an old movie, I just saw it on television for the first time. It is a great Saturday afternoon movie to watch with kids. I didn't remember Jonathan Taylor Thomas (Weiss) in any other shows, but he has a very commanding presence on screen. The director really knew how capture his very cherub face with his captivating blond hair and haunting blue eyes.For a while I was just mesmerized watching how he moved throughout the film. I could actually 'see' his maturity and growth as he encountered many antics with his brothers. It was very believable and the theme is definitely something I would encourage my students to evaluate and analyze as their own lives reflect some of the same things these young men experienced. It had action, adventure, love and caring parents -for once! The family structure was secure and I was happy to see that. Our kids see so much violence and family destruction- they need to see something positive. I will definitely add this one to my list of videos my students can watch.

I started making VHS tapes of Marty Stouffer's Wild America TV show as a young adult. Back then, the series was aired on the local PBS station. It became one of the shows I was most glad to support with my PBS membership.

If you liked the TV series as much as I, you will no doubt enjoy this movie about Marty and his brothers as well. Mark Stouffer worked with Marty on the TV series as an assistant director and Marty's wife and kids shared the spotlight with Marty at times as well. Mark has also done work on other television shows including some that have ties to nature like Wild America.

I thought this flick was great fun. I thought the acting was pretty decent and not as bad as other people say. Sure, the three leads are all teen idols, but I am not going to knock their performances because of that. Still, I continue to enjoy this flick, and always will

I recently watched this movie on a Sunny Sunday morning whilst in bed, sounds very ideological, but is true. I must say I do not believe it is all that bad. OK at times the screenplay does stray away from it's original context and the stereotypical WASP family may reinforce unrealistic portrayals of Hollywood, but with this, with a little effort on our behalf, we the audience can allow ourselves to be whisked away into the young boys adventure, out of the harsh realities of life. When analysed, issues of father and son relationships and the transition of boy to manhood become quite clear. Taking into consideration that the film was made nearly ten years ago, I feel it serves importantly as balance between strong realism and fairy tale.