Lad, A Dog (film)
Lad: A Dog | |
---|---|
Directed by | Leslie H. Martinson Aram Avakian |
Screenplay by | |
Based on | Vanguard Productions |
Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
Release date | June 6, 1962 |
Running time | 98 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Lad: A Dog is a 1962 American
Plot
Purebred
Later, Lad saves Glure's daughter Angela from a poisonous snake by knocking her backwards to get her out of harm's way, then fighting and killing the snake, getting bitten in the process. Her nurse (Alice Pearce) initially does not see the snake, and begins beating Lad for "attacking" the little girl. Distraught, Angela stands and walks for the first time since her illness to stop the nurse's abuse of her friend. Lad disappears for three days, reappearing covered in mud but cured of the poison.
Lad is bred with another prize-winning collie, Lady, and they have two male puppies which are named Little Lad and Wolf. Angela is allowed her choice of one as a present to her when they are old enough to leave their mother & she chooses Little Lad. However, Jackson White (Jack Daly), a poacher Lad fought and chased off the property before, sets fire to barn out of vengeance. Elizabeth is injured and Little Lad is killed but not Wolf. Lad later aids in capturing White when he breaks into the house to try to steal Lad's gold trophy from the dog show. Angela is initially inconsolable over the loss of her puppy Little Lad, and refuses to have anything to do with Wolf. After he is nearly lost in another accident, she changes her mind and accepts Wolf as her new dog.
Production
Max J. Rosenberg, of
Warner Brothers initially hired Aram Avakian, a "talented, aggressive young ex-film editor" known for his avant-garde tendencies, to direct the film.[1] The studio wanted a sentimental dog story that played true to the novel, which Avakian opposed.[1] In a 1969 Life interview, Avakian stated that he "wanted to make a kind of pop, camp thing that wouldn't be a complete ordeal for parents" while everyone else involved in the production wanted "Dick, Jane and Doggie".[2] Jack Warner, then head of the studio, eventually fired him, bringing the more conventional Leslie H. Martinson to complete the film.[1][2][3] Peter Breck and Peggy McCay were cast as Lad's owners, renamed to Stephen and Elizabeth Tremayne. Veteran actor Carroll O'Connor was hired to play the pompous and newly wealthy Hamilcar Q. Glure, with the role of his daughter played by Angela Cartwright, a noted young actress who had starred in The Danny Thomas Show. To cast the role of Lad, a talent search was conducted, eventually resulting in the selection of a collie from the San Fernando Valley who was credited simply as "Lad". The film is set in a modified version of the Place, with Pompton Lake reduced to a river with a large dock. The house, though similar to the real Terhune home, even including duplicates of the stone lions on the veranda, was built on a scale three times larger than the original.[1]
Well-known screenwriter Lillie Hayward, and newcomer Roberta Hodes, were hired to adapt the novel for film. They combined several of the stories from the novel, modifying characters to create a single flowing narrative. For example, the crippled girl who was a neighbor girl in the original novel became Glure's daughter. Noting Terhune's frequent disdain for the Ramapough Mountain Indians, they named the film's villain Jackson White, a play on the nickname used to refer to those people. White became the catch all villain of the film, who poaches deer, sets fire to the Tremayne barn, and break into the house to try to steal a gold trophy won by Lad.[1]
Lad: A Dog was released to theaters on June 6, 1962.[4] The 98 minute film was released to VHS format on January 31, 1995.[5]
Reception
The film was considered to be a "B-movie" for its low production budget. Terhune biographer Irving Litvag praised O'Connor's performance as Glure, feeling his talent made him "seem human" and "a person of dignity and love" versus Terhune's "overdrawn and exaggerated" silly character. He felt the setting and cinematography was "typical Hollywood overstatement", and that as a whole found that Terhune's "sentimental writing" did not do well in film form, calling the resulting film "cloying" and a "minor, unsung film." However, he noted that fans of the novels seemed to thoroughly enjoy the film, suspecting part of it was the "handsome collie" found to play the titular role, and seeing the names of the beloved collies they knew on the screen.
References
- ^ ISBN 0-06-126350-8.
- ^ a b Meryman, Richard (November 7, 1969). "A Cinematic Assault". Life. p. 66.
- ISBN 0-8093-2654-X.
- ^ "Lad: A Dog (1962)". Turner Classic Movies. Retrieved October 22, 2009.
- ASIN 6303369081.
- ISSN 0027-0407.
- Tampa Tribune. p. 18.
- ISBN 978-0-452-28978-9.
External links
- Lad: A Dog at IMDb
- Lad: A Dog at the TCM Movie Database
- Lad: A Dog at AllMovie