Movie Star Pets

Dogs and sleds raced all over the place and all through the movie Iron Will. This movie was about a young man who teamed up with his late father’s lead dog to take part in a 500-mile dogsled race from Winnipeg, Manitoba, to St. Paul, Minnesota.

Over harsh winter terrain with no less harsh competitors and a finale which made me think, for a very brief moment, that the director was using the wrong script by mistake.

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This movie, Iron Will, which was full of heart-pounding sequences, was produced by Walt Disney Pictures in 1994 under the direction of Charles Haid with screenplay written by John Michael Hayes, Djordje Milicevic and Jeff Arch. Mackenzie Astin took the role of Will Stoneman, the young man who had to take on his father’s responsibilities after his father perished in a sledding accident where the late father had to sacrifice his own life to save his son.

The star of the movie was Gus, an all-white Siberian Husky. This particular breed from the group of working dogs known collectively as sled dogs was from eastern Siberia and belonged to the Spitz genetic family. It is easily recognized by its thick double-layered fur, a full-bush of a tail that curved over its back like a sickle and its small, erect, pointed ears. Colors range from white to black, often with distinctive facial mask markings.

The Siberian Husky has been a vital member of numerous human expeditions in the inhospitable frozen artic barren waste land of both the North as well as the South Pole. Balto, a Siberian Husky which was the lead dog in the historic delivery of diphtheria serum from Nenana to Nome, six hundred miles away, in 1925, was commemorated with a bronze statue in the Central Park in New York City, for its indomitable spirit.

This same never-say-die attitude was clearly evident in the demeanor of Gus, the canine hero in the movie Iron Will. After Will’s father’s untimely demise, the young man had to find the wherewithal to keep the home farm out of the clutches of the bank. A 500-mile dogsled race with a $10,000 prize gave him the opportunity to confirm his new stature as the man of the house.

However, Will was young and untried and when his spirit faltered it was Gus, the experienced lead dog inherited from his father, that literally pulled Will along the road to success. This was not just a heroic characteristic that was conveniently invented by the director of the movie to fit the script.

In real life, a Siberian Husky is well-known as a very persistent dog. It is also hyper-active and very intelligent. It is not the type of dog that just waits for its master to provide for it, regardless of whether its needs were just nutrition or entertainment. A Siberian Husky is easily bored and left to its own devices, would make short work of digging a tunnel under the fence to get through to the other side where the grass is greener and the fun is greater, so to say.

Towards the end of the Iron Will movie, when the dogsled race reached the final straight, Will fell together with the sled. Will was totally exhausted and did not seem to have anything left in him to make it to the finishing line, despite the roaring cheers of the home crowd. This was where, for a very short moment, I thought the director had picked up a wrong copy of the script by mistake and was going to end the movie with a sickening anti-climax.

I should have known better. Gus, the indomitable Siberian Husky, was there barking and mushing with all the ferocity and tenacity it could muster. Finally, I will leave it up to you to savor the ending when you watch the Iron Will DVD.

One word to the wise. If you do not have fully-trial-tested iron will, do not, I repeat, do not get a Siberian Husky for a pet. You might well end up being owned.

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