Shiloh movie review & film summary (1997)
One weekend I was sent on my first plane journey, to visit relatives. When I returned, I was told that Blackie had been hit by a car and killed. I didn't believe it then and I don't believe it now, and inside of me, all of these years later, is fury that has not gone away. Adults may have the power to take away a kid's dog and tell him a story about it, but they do not have the right.
Some of those feelings came into play when I saw "Shiloh,'' which is a remarkably mature and complex story about a boy who loves a dog and cannot bear to see it mistreated. It isn't some dumb kiddie picture. It's about deep emotions, and represents the real world with all of its terrors and responsibilities.
The kid's name is Marty (Blake Heron). One day the dog follows him home. The dog has a welt over its eye, and we know how it got it; the opening scene shows a hunter named Judd (Scott Wilson) banging the dog with a gun butt. The dog is afraid of Judd and loves Marty, who names it Shiloh.
Marty's parents are a mailman named Ray (Michael Moriarty) and his wife, Louise (Ann Dowd), who would like to get a job as a manicurist, because the family needs the money. They live in a rural area near a general store run by Mrs. Wallace (Bonnie Bartlett), whose husband, Doc (Rod Steiger), can patch up people or animals.
Marty's dad explains to him that the dog is Judd's property and they must return it, which they do, only to hear Judd promise that if the dog runs away again, he'll beat it to within an inch of its life. The dog runs away again, and comes to Marty, who hides it in a shed on the property. Then Shiloh is injured in a dogfight, and Marty can no longer keep the secret. His father is angry with him for concealing the dog and for lying to him. Marty feels he had to lie, to save Shiloh's life. He begs his mother to intervene: "Dad will never change his mind and you'll never stand up to him,'' he says bitterly. His mother will not keep secrets from her husband and supports him, even though her heart breaks for her son. And the father is standing on principle.
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