''Wolf Dog'', also known as ''A Boy and His Dog'', is a 1958

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

film directed and produced by Sam Newfield and produced by Regal Films. The film stars Jim Davis and Allison Hayes.

Cast

*Jim Davis

Production

In August 1957, Newfield and a camera crew filmed the movie in and around

Markdale, Ontario Markdale is a community in the Municipality of Grey Highlands, in Grey County, Ontario, Canada. The population was 1,216 in 2016, an increase of 3.5% from 1,175 in 2011. In 2016, the average age of the population was approximately 43 years old. ...

, near

Owen Sound, Ontario Owen Sound ( 2021 Census population 21,612) is a city in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. The county seat of Grey County, it is located at the mouths of the Pottawatomi and Sydenham Rivers on an inlet of Georgian Bay. The primary tourist attractio ...

, Canada. The movie co-starred Hollywood actors Jim Davis, Allison Hayes and John Hart along with Canadian actors

Austin Willis Alexander Austin Willis, (30 September 1917 – 4 April 2004) was a Canadian actor and television host. Biography Austin was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia to parents Alexander Samuel and Emma Graham (Pushie) Willis. His older brother, J. Fran ...

and Tony Brown. Several locals were offered a chance to be unpaid "extras". Among those were Paul Hutton, Jerry Bartley, Constable Clarence Bowins, David Jackson, Officer Jack Johnston, Ron Wyvill, Don Wyvill.

Reception

While not an artistic or commercial success, the film is noteworthy in that it was created almost 40 years before

Telefilm Canada Telefilm Canada is a Crown corporation reporting to Canada's federal government through the Minister of Canadian Heritage. Headquartered in Montreal, Telefilm provides services to the Canadian audiovisual industry with four regional offices in ...

and federal government subsidies enabled big-name movies to be filmed in Canadian locales. Markdale residents were delighted to have Hollywood make a film in their town. It was hoped a film set in "The Great North Country" would be a crossover hit in the U.S. and the Commonwealth, both lucrative movie markets. For reasons unknown, the film disappeared from the public eye for almost 50 years. An unsubstantiated rumor suggested one of the main actors wanted all traces of the film destroyed. The only known copies of the film are an incomplete version stored at the

National Archives of Canada Library and Archives Canada (LAC; french: Bibliothèque et Archives Canada) is the federal institution, tasked with acquiring, preserving, and providing accessibility to the documentary heritage of Canada. The national archive and library is t ...

and a complete version at the U.S. Library of Congress. Copies of the movie can be found at the Markdale Public Library, Ontario, Canada, donated by the creator of the fan site, Jeff Wilson. He, along with actors from the film, Ron Wyvill and Paul Hutton, appeared in a short documentary made by Rogers Television, Owen Sound. Wilson and Wyvill also organized several screenings in the town of Markdale, Ontario, where the film was originally shot. There is also a link to a radio interview with Ron Wyvill on YouTube which can be found under the channel Toonguy85, belonging to Wilson. All distribution copyrights belong to

20th Century Fox 20th Century Studios, Inc. (previously known as 20th Century Fox) is an American film production company headquartered at the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles. As of 2019, it serves as a film production arm of Walt Dis ...

References

External links

* *
Wolf Dog Fansite
1958 films English-language Canadian films Films directed by Sam Newfield 1958 Western (genre) films Canadian Western (genre) films 1950s English-language films 1950s Canadian films {{1950s-Western-film-stub