Call of the Forest

Beautifully photographed by Karl Struss and capably directed by film editor John F. Link (the second of only two movies as a director), this is one of these movies in which the humans are often forced to play second fiddle to the animals—in this case mostly a black stallion named "King". Indeed, although Ken Curtis gets to sing a song (appropriately "Git Along Little Dogies") and spends a lot of time talking about his search for a lost gold mine, we never actually see the mine because the camera is so busy with the "King" and Charlie Hughes sub-plot. Indeed, Curtis could complain that once the wrangling and the singing is out of the way, he has little to do in the picture but play second fiddle to personable villain, Robert Lowery (who has a great henchman in our old friend, Jack Ingram). All the same, Curtis is far better treated than Martha Sherrill, who is prominently featured in all the film's advertising blocks but can be spotted in the actual movie itself for all of about thirty seconds. On the other hand, Chief Thundercloud has a comparatively sizable role with close-ups yet! But then, "Black Diamond", the horse, "Fuzzy", the bear, and company get lots of close-ups too!

It's obvious that "Call of the Forest" was made on the cheap....really, really cheap! So much of the footage is randomly tossed in and it's a shame, as it could have been a good movie.

Bob Brand (Ken Curtis) owns a small ranch and has recently captured a very wild horse. For some reason, the horse is devoted to his son, Bobby. It might just be because the boy seems to have a way with animals...all sorts of animals around the ranch.

Bob has been spending much of his recent time looking for a lost mine. Because he's such a swell guy, he's planning on give it to the local Indians. But an evil man wants to find the mine all for himself...and he's willing to kill if needed to get it.

The problem with the story is that HUGE portions are made up of stock footage. Again and again, VERY random animals are supposed to be hanging out with Bobby...though in most cases, the kid doesn't interact with them because they weren't there...they were just stock film clips. And, it's inserted so often and so poorly that it makes the film look cheap and awful.

Overall, the only reason I think anyone might want to see this is to see Ken Curtis (Bob). Curtis was later quite famous for playing Festus on "Gunsmoke"...a grizzled old coot. But here, he is amazing with guns, a nice singer and reasonably handsome....very much unlike Festus.

The adult actors in this modern west drama play second fiddle to the animals and young Charlie Hughes in Call Of The Forest. In fact young master Hughes narrates the film in flashback, something a child actor is not called on to do normally.

For a kid from New York City Hughes takes to the wild west and loves life on his father's ranch. Ken Curtis also has a yen to claim a lost gold mine actually given to him by Chief Thundercloud in appreciation for the kindness Curtis has shown the Indians. Unfortunately there's a villain here in Robert Lowery who wants that lost mine for himself if it exists.

Most of the film is taken up with the taming of the black wild stallion King who takes to Hughes the way Fury took to Joey Newton. In fact there are a few similarities for this film to the old Fury series. In fact Hughes the city kid has all the wild life in the area liking him with the exception of a mountain lion. Don't fear about that though when the cougar meets up with King.

Call Of The Forest is a Lippert film and it's not a bad one for family viewing. In fact we never saw anyone on the big or small screen with quite the knack with 'Critters' until Elly Mae Clampett.