Walt Disney Studio's beautifully photographed White Fang (1991) is loosely based on one of the all-time classic animal stories, Jack London's 1907 tale of the friendship between a young adventurer in Alaska's Yukon Valley and the white wolf-dog he rescues from a professional dog-fight promoter. In one his first roles after his breakthrough success in Dead Poets Society (1989), Ethan Hawke stars as Jack Conroy, whose search for his late father's lost gold mine is enlivened by his canine companion, played by Jed. Hawke has named Jack London among his favorite authors.

Dick Mackey, an expert in cold-weather wildernesses and a winner of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, served as a technical consultant on White Fang. Bart the bear, the hero of the Jean-Jacques Annaud's The Bear (1989), makes a guest appearance as a ferocious villain. The film's producers were given a commendation by the Humane Society for their exemplary treatment of the animal actors. The film spawned a sequel, White Fang II: Myth of the White Wolf (1994). An Italian film version of London's story, White Fang and the Hunter, was produced in 1975.

Producer: Lynn Bigelow (Executive Producer), Jim Kouf (Executive Producer), Marykay Powell
Director: Randal Kleiser
Screenplay: Jeanne Rosenberg, Nick Thiel, David Fallon, from novel by Jack London
Cinematography: Tony Pierce-Roberts
Original Music: Basil Poledouris, Fiachra Trench, Shirley Walker, Hans Zimmer
Production Design/Art Direction: Michael S. Bolton, Sandy Cochrane
Editing: Lisa Day
Principal Cast: Klaus Maria Brandauer (Alex), Ethan Hawke (Jack), Seymour Cassel (Skunker), Susan Hogan (Belinda), James Remar (Beauty), Bill Moseley (Luke).
C-109m. Closed captioning.

by Roger Fristoe