More Canaan Journeys - The Beast of War

Over the years, I had a number of dogs that had roles in plays, movies, or commercials.  It was very challenging, and as long as it was only once in a while, it was fun – I would never dream of doing it as a major full time job!

The biggest film project that I was involved in was an American movie made in Israel in 1987 called “The Beast of War.”  It had a real Hollywood cast – Steven Bauer, Jason Patric, George Dzundza. The story was about the war in Afghanistan, and, as at the time filming a movie in Afghanistan was not highly recommended, it was decided that Israel was similar enough in terrain and modern enough in facilities to be an excellent substitute.

The script had a number of scenes that involved a pack of jackals or wild dogs.  The film company soon discovered, on their arrival in Israel, that a pack of trained jackals was not readily available (surprise, surprise!)  However, it was suggested to them, by someone highly intelligent I am sure, that a pack of Canaans might just suit the purpose.

I was contacted and requested to bring one of the Canaans to an audition in one of the fanciest hotels in Tel Aviv. The hoteliers were not enthusiastic when I showed up in the lobby with a dog.  But film companies spend a lot of money in hotels like that, and we were allowed up to the director’s room so he could see the dog.

I had brought Yitzhar with me, since he was the wildest appearing of the dogs.  Yitzhar had a very penetrating and wolf-like stare that could be very discomforting.  The director was indeed impressed, and I was hired to provide a pack of five dogs to work in the movie.

This was not a simple task.  Getting five Canaans to work together, off lead, and in some scenes from a long distance, without them deciding to have a free-for-all in the middle, was not easy.  The pack consisted of three bitches and two dogs, all of which were already obedience trained, and which, fortunately for me, already had experience working together from a previous movie we had done.  So after a short refresher course of who was the boss, we were able to get down to business.

The actions that were required of the dogs were not easy.  The story involved a Russian tank crew that gets lost in the Afghanistan desert, and the dogs track them.   There was even an attack scene involved.  This was of course the hardest to train the dogs to do, as Canaans are not the type of dog to attack without a good reason. I knew that I would not get the dogs to really attack on command, and I had no desire, really, to encourage the dogs to bite.  I decided that the best way to accomplish this scene was with food.  I explained to the film company just what equipment I needed for the training, and they promised to provide it.

One evening late, my daughter Dorcas and I arrived home from an evening out, and, to our horror, found a man’s body lying on the porch in front of the door.  After the first shock, on closer inspection, we found that it was a human sized dummy (at least six feet tall) dressed in a Russian army uniform, exact in every detail down to the boots.  This was to train the dogs.

The method was simple.  In the film, the dogs were meant to jump up and attack a man who was left tied out on a huge rock.  So I tied the dummy up on a terrace of about the right height, and started to hide tasty pieces of sausage in its clothes and boots.  The dogs quickly learned that they would find treats if they starting searching the dummy and they quickly learned to do this with great enthusiasm, leaping up on the dummy and competing with each other to find the sausage.  As I hid the treats inside the clothes and boots, and inside pockets, they learned that they would have to grab, pull, and even tear the clothes to obtain their goal.  On camera, I knew, this food-digging would look like a real attack.  As the dogs were competing with each other, they also growled and snarled, which made it all look very authentic.

Finally, rehearsals were over and the time had come for filming.  The movie was being made near Eilat, and we stayed on location.  The scenes with the dogs were expected to take about a week to film.

The location was out in the desert.  For the Canaans, it was like coming home; they immediately felt perfectly comfortable.  It was very hot already in May, with the temperatures already close to the summer maximum.  This didn’t bother the dogs. As we sat around waiting for our scenes, they dug themselves deep holes under the scrubby bushes in the vicinity and lay there comfortably sheltered from the heat and glare.  Being Canaans, they also very quickly took possession of the territory, and would not allow other crew members to approach “their” bushes.

The dogs, of course, were physically in very good condition with thick shiny coats since most of them had a career in the dog show ring.  The director felt that they looked too good for the role; they needed make-up!  The movie’s make-up expert was not enthusiastic about the idea; she had worked on all kinds of actors, but never on a dog!  However, she had no choice, and the dogs ended up with all sorts of brown and black powder rubbed into their coats to make them look scruffy.   The filming went well.  I was very proud of the dogs’ performance. 

There were some very difficult scenes.  One was the opening scene of the film, a close-up that showed the dogs sleeping on a ledge in the desert with the sun coming up.  Suddenly, one dog lifts his head and alerts, and then the others also come alert.  This was very difficult for several reasons.  First of all, I had to train the dogs to “sleep,” in other words, to lie flat and still with their eyes closed.  They had to do this even though all the crew and cameras were only a foot or two away.  Another difficulty was to get only one dog to raise his head first, while the others remained “sleeping.”  And the scene had to be shot exactly at sunrise so there was no possibility for numerous retakes.  The dogs performed like troopers and I was tremendously proud of them!

In another difficult scene, I left the dogs with a few of the crewmembers, and I was taken about a kilometer or so away across the desert.  The dogs were let free and I whistled to them, and they came running to me.  The scene beautifully pictured a wild pack running across the wilderness.

Of course, the dogs, like any actors, had their moments of temperament.  It was very hot, the workdays were long, and sometimes the dogs got fed up.  One day, while waiting for a shot to be set up, the two males, Yitzhar and Tiggy, lost patience and decided to have a go at each other.  As I tried to separate them, the bitches, inspired by the boys, decided to join in.  Trying to separate five dogs on your own just doesn’t work!  I called to the crewmembers standing around to come and help.  None of them was willing to get near that snarling mass.  Finally, I just waded in, grabbed a dog, lifted it out, grabbed a crewmember, told him, “Hold on to this dog!” and went back to grab another, in the same way.  In a few minutes, everything was again calm.  The dogs felt better because they had worked the edge off of their nerves, and no one had been hurt.  The crewmembers were not in such good shape, however; it took them a few days to get over the trauma, and I seemed to have gone up in their esteem for being ready to wade into the battle.

On another day, when I was off the set for a few hours, one of the dogs got loose, took possession, and wouldn’t let anyone into “his” part of the location.  For several hours, everyone had to detour around that area, until I got back and called him off.

Finally, we got to the final scene with the dogs, which was by far the most difficult.  This was the “attack” scene.  In this scene, the “hero” of the film is left staked out on a rock in the desert by his fellow soldiers, and the pack of wild dogs, who had been tracking them throughout the movie, find him and start to attack.  The hero manages to save himself by rolling a grenade into the midst of the pack, which explodes and demolishes the pack.

As is obvious from this description, this scene was not likely to be something the dogs would enjoy doing.  Of course, the “explosion” of the grenade was simply a harmless smoke bomb.  But I knew that the dogs would not at all appreciate having even a harmless smoke bomb exploding at their feet, and I had warned the director that this had better be the last scene the dogs were expected to do, because after this, they would not have fond memories of the set or the people involved.  I also warned him that they had better get it right on the first take, as there was no chance that the dogs would agree to participate in a retake.

Everything was set up.  The scene was being played by a stuntman since the star was not about to expose himself to the chance of being bitten by accident.  The stuntman was rather nervous as well. He asked me if I was sure that the dogs wouldn’t really bite, and I assured him that he was safe.  He took up his position on the rock, and I planted sausage in his boots, pockets, and other parts of his clothing.

The dogs hadn’t been fed that day, so that they would be really eager to get the sausage.  We did a rehearsal, and everything went beautifully.  The filming began.  The scene was filmed several times, from different angles, with the explosion being the last shot.  The dogs performed beautifully in the first shots, running up to the rock, leaping up and grabbing the sausage out of the actor’s clothing and boots, which on screen really looked as if they were attacking him.

And then the time came for the last shot.  The smoke bomb was set in place, the cameras rolled, the dogs were released, and BOOM!

The dogs, as one, turned and ran, heading for the distant hills.  No one was going to get another chance to set off a bomb under their feet!  I whistled frantically, and gradually, four of them turned back and returned to their familiar resting holes under the scrub.  But the fifth, one of the bitches, Hava, continued running like a small brown streak of lightning, until she disappeared into the hills.

As this was the last shot on this location, the crew was all packed up now and ready to go home.  There was a van waiting for me, to take the dogs and me home. Our job was finished.  “What are you going to do now?” the driver asked me.  “Wait,” I said.

The other vehicles drove off on their way home.  After an hour or so, the site was abandoned, except for me, the dogs, and the driver, who was not at all happy about the situation.  We all sat there quietly as the sun disappeared behind the mountains.  As the dusk thickened, there was a noise from the direction of the van, which was parked with the door open.  There sat Hava in the van, ready to go home.  Now that everyone had gone and she was sure no one would set off any more bombs, she was ready to come back.

Well, that had been an interesting experience, but I was glad that it was over. Or, I thought it was over.

 About a week later, I got a phone call from the director.  The shots of the attack had been damaged in the developing laboratory and were unusable.  The scene would have to be shot again.  Would I be willing to come down again with the dogs for a few days?

“You must be crazy!” was my first response.  “These dogs are not stupid - they are not going to be willing to get anywhere near the spot where you blew them up!” But this was a critical scene in the movie.  "You have to do it for us." He pleaded. "This is one of the most important scenes in the film!" "But I really don't think the dogs will perform," I answered.  "We'll pay you time and a half if you are just willing to come down and try," he said.  "No, we'll pay you double!" This was very convincing.  "Well, okay, I'll try it," I answered, "but I certainly can't guarantee that you'll get the scene you want."

 So once again the dogs and I arrived down in the desert.  The dogs were definitely unhappy about the idea; the location had very unpleasant associations for them.  However, I had not fed them for a day, and they were hungry, and when I got out those tasty little pieces of sausage, they started to show more interest in the idea. 

Canaans are very much dogs with minds of their own, and cannot usually be “bought” by food.  However, among the five, there was one bitch, Terra, who was a true chow hound willing to do anything for a tidbit, and now she was hungry.  Two of the others were also willing to consider approaching the spot in order to get their treats.  The last two, true Canaans through and through, were very suspicious of the whole thing, and hung back on the fringe of the group, not willing to come up to the rock where terrible things had happened.

I informed the director that this was about as good as it would get.  I also warned him that this time, there was one take only and after that, he didn’t have a chance in hell of ever getting any of these dogs anywhere near this location again.

The take was a success, though in my opinion it was not as good as the first one that had been ruined by the lab.  The dogs took off, but by now, having been through the whole thing before, didn’t run far.

I waited eagerly for the movie to be released. I wanted to see the results of all this hard work.  But “The Beasts of War” was not a great success in the U.S., and never got to the movie theatres in Israel.  Finally, after a few years, it came out on video, and I managed to get a copy.  I thought it was a pretty good movie, actually, and I was really proud of the dogs.  They looked great on screen!  All of the several weeks of work, of course, came down to a few minutes of screen time - but I was proud of it!

The movie has now been showed on Israeli TV, though I don’t think anyone realized that those are Canaans “starring” in it…

For those who have enjoyed this entry, it is an excerpt from my book, "Tails of Shaar Hagai" - many more stories like this....

More Canaan Journeys

A few more stories of Canaans that came home…

Pashosh was a puppy that we brought back from the desert on one of our trips, along with his brother, Pereh (who is one of Habibi’s grandfathers).  The two tiny puppies were pulled out of their den under an old oil barrel when they were about five weeks old and handed to us by the Bedouins.  And of course we took them – even though we were of course interested in having them, if we had not taken them, they most likely would have been killed.

I couldn’t keep two more males, so Pashosh went to a friend who had a few Canaans, loved the breed, and kept them as pets and guard dogs.  He lived on the edge of town and had a large nursery for various types of palm trees, and the dogs had solved the problem of thefts.

Pashosh grew into an excellent guard dog with a very strong temperament.  He was extremely devoted to his owner and family, consisting of his wife, and two grown sons who did not live at home but visited often.  But outsiders were absolutely not allowed.  Pashosh had to be closed in the house or back garden when other people were around.

By the time he was about two years of age, he had a few bites to his credit – not real bites, but nips that showed that he meant business in his job of guarding.  My friend could control him very well, but his wife could not, and was afraid that the result would be more serious.  So the decision was made, sadly, that Pashosh would have to go to a new home.

A  new home was found, with another farmer who wanted a serious guard dog and did not have a lot of people coming around.  Pashosh had never done any travelling in the car, even his vaccinations were done by the veterinarian coming to the house.  So when he was loaded in the car to go to his new home, this was a totally new experience. The new place was about 30 kilometers away.

Two days later, the new owner called my friend to tell him that Pashosh was gone – he had managed to pull his head out of his collar (Canaans are quite expert at this), and had run off.  No one had seen him since, although they had looked.  My friend drove out there and tried calling him and looking for him, to no avail. 

Three weeks later, my friend got up in the morning to find Pashosh, filthy and thin, sitting outside the gate waiting to be let in.  He had come home over 30 kilometers, through an area that he was totally unfamiliar with, and also would have had to cross several major and very busy highways to get there. 

Needless to say, Pashosh was welcomed home and any thoughts of rehoming him were forgotten.

Next case:

Shelley and Dvash were two young Canaan females of about eight months old that I exported to the US, to a breeder friend.  She had been breeding Canaans for several years and had a number of dogs and was well acquainted with the breed and its quirks.  She lived in Massachusetts in a small town, and her house was on the edge of town adjoining a national forest area.  She had a well fenced kennel with big yards for the dogs to run in.

Well, never underestimate a Canaan.  A week or so after the girls arrived at her place, they decided that the call of the wild was too tempting to ignore, dug under the fence and took off to the forest.

Of course, all authorities and people in the vicinity were notified.  My friend got many notifications, “Yes, we have seen the dogs, they are running around in the forest.”  They did not go far, enjoyed being in sight of people, but stayed out of reach – when anyone tried to get close enough to catch them, they laughed and romped off into the trees.  My friend tried calling them, and they laughed at her as well, and would eat the food left for them when there was no one around.  This was fun!  Why come back?

After a few days of freedom, Shelley and Dvash seemed to decide that they had milked all the possibilities of this new life style and it was time to return to “civilization”. The next time my friend came out to offer them food, they came over with wagging tails.  Time to go home…

Then there was Ella.  Ella grew up as the beloved house pet of an elderly woman who lived in a Tel Aviv suburb.  When Ella was 4, the woman passed away.  Ella was rehomed in a moshav about 20 kilometers away, with a family that were very animal oriented, breeding horses, and with another Canaan mix for a companion.  She adjusted very well and was very happy in her new home, and loved by her new owners.

On Yom Atzmaut (Israel Independence Day), it is common, as in most of the “civilized” world, to have fireworks displays.  The following day, Ella’s owner called me to say that she had been terrified by the fireworks and had run away in a panic and couldn’t be found.  This is a very common occurrence, many dogs get lost on the “fireworks holidays”.  He searched the whole area, notified all the vets, put up posters – but all to no avail.  There was no sign of Ella.

Three weeks later, he called to tell me that Ella had come home, thin and dirty, but fine.  He had no idea where she had been all that time, but she was glad to be home.

I am quite sure I know where Ella was.  She was still fairly new in this home, and suddenly there was something terrifying happening.  So the logical thing to do was to run back to her former home, where she had always felt safe.  20 kilometers is not that far, but it can take some time.  When she got there, though, she did not find anyone familiar – her former master was gone, there were new people in the house, and there was no one there to welcome her.  So there was nothing to do but to return to her new home, which now was the most familiar and safe place.  Being a Canaan, she was clever enough to avoid the perils of the journey – highways, strange dogs, strange people, and to get home safely, to owners who were very glad to see her.

Canaans like to make their own choices, but when they choose, they are determined…



Pereh and Pashosh in the Bedouin camp



Canaan Journeys - Kotev

A few days ago, I got a phone call from a veterinarian in a small town about 40 kilometers south of us.  She told me that there was a lost dog that had been taken in by a couple in the town, and they were trying to track him, and from the microchip, they found that he was listed as coming from me.  It was a Canaan, she said, about a year old.

I always make sure that all puppies that leave here are microchipped, so that whatever may happen with them, they can always be traced.  The microchip number is registered with the kennel club, as well as with the licensing authorities here.

As soon as she described the dog, I knew who it was, and when I checked out the chip number, it was verified.  The dog was Kotev, a year old son of Habibi and Lilo.

Kotev grew up here with me and the rest of his Canaan family until he was about six months old.  He then went to someone who seemed to be a good choice for a home for him.   Kotev’s new person was a young man with a small horse farm, who wanted a dog as a companion, to be able to run along with him when he went riding, and who would also guard the property.  He had experience with dogs and very much wanted a Canaan.

The first reports of Kotev in his new home were enthusiastic.  He quickly got acquainted with the horses, was getting bonded to his new owner, and seemed to be making a good adjustment.

Some time passed, and then one day, the young man called to tell me that Kotev had run away.  He couldn’t tell me just what happened, just that he had been letting him run loose around the farm, and suddenly he disappeared.  He had looked for him, and couldn’t find him, and no one around seemed to have seen him.

It is not very unusual for a young dog to become frightened of something and to bolt, but it is very untypical for a Canaan to “run away”.  The usual behavior is for the dog to find a safe place to hide, to wait for whatever was frightening to disappear, and then to come back, or to return when his person goes out calling him.  I am familiar with a number of cases like this.

I notified the authorities and vets in the area, but there was no result.  Kotev had disappeared without trace.

Now, five months later, he had turned up in a town about 25 kilometers from where he had disappeared.

I called the young man and told him that Kotev had been found.  “What do you say!” was his response.  I gave him the phone number of the vet who said she would put him in touch with the people who had him, and told him he could go to take him home.

The next day, the vet called me back.  He had not come to get Kotev, she told me, and she didn’t think he wanted the dog.  I told her I was on my way, I was coming to get him.

The response of the fellow when I called him back was, “Well, my situation has changed meanwhile, and it has been a long time…maybe you can pay me and take him.”  Well, take him I would, there was no question about that, but he could forget about any payment – and there were a few more juicy bits to the conversation relating to someone who wanted to just abandon the dog….

The couple who had Kotev lived on the very edge of the town, adjoining a large area of open fields.  They lived in a small apartment.  I knocked on the door, and Alexandra opened it cautiously.  But before she could even get the door open, Kotev pushed her out of the way and was all over me in total joy, jumping, licking, and like his father Habibi, grabbing my sleeve to pull my hand in his direction.  “I knew you would come,” was what he was saying.

Alexandra and her husband Yaakov are wonderful people.  They have six cats in the house, all rescued from the streets, and some of them with healed injuries that show how hard their previous life was, and another young dog who also is a rescue.  They told me that they would have loved to keep Kotev, but their place is just too small – very true, it is a tiny apartment.  

Kotev apparently turned up some time before in the fields near the apartment.  He wouldn’t let anyone get near him, but Alexandra told me that every day he went to one spot at the edge of the field and sat there waiting, as if he was expecting someone to come for him.  She and others that lived nearby left food for him, but he would only eat when no one was around.

Then the weather started to change and there was a storm.  Yaakov couldn’t bear to see the dog out in the bad weather – and when he approached, Kotev came up to him and licked his hand, and Yaakov brought him back to the apartment. Covered with mud, he willingly presented each foot to be cleaned before he came into the house.

He lived with them until they finally managed, through the chip, to find me.

As I left with Kotev to go home, some of the neighbors stopped me to find out what was happening – worried, perhaps, that Kotev was being taken away by the authorities. They were very happy to hear that he was coming home with me.  They had all become quite fond of him.

Kotev was thrilled to be back in his “childhood” surroundings. His sister Kerrie at first looked at him with great suspicion – “Who are you and what are you doing here???” – but after a few minutes of inspection, realized – “Oh, its you!!!” and the two started happily running around the yard in a game of tag.

There is no way of knowing what happened to Kotev during those months that he was missing, or how he got to that field.  Was he stolen? Was he abandoned?  It is hard to imagine that he ran away and then continued in that direction which is the opposite direction to here – Canaans in general have a very good sense of direction and try to travel, if lost, in the direction of home.  We will never know what really happened, but despite it all, he is still a calm and happy boy, still a bit suspicious of people, whereas in the past he was very friendly, but not frightened, and willing to follow Kerrie’s lead and come up to them.  So he doesn’t seem to have been badly treated or frightened enough to lose his trust in people.  And he seems to have known that in the end, he would not be left abandoned – he would be brought home.

Some days after he got home, Alexandra and Yaakov were visiting in the area, and stopped by to see him.  They were worried that he would not remember them, or now that he was home, would not want to approach them.  But Kotev was thrilled to see them, very affectionate and happy, and when they had to leave, I could see the conflict he had of whether he wanted to go with them or to stay with me.  A testimony to these lovely people and the good care and affection they had given him – a Canaan never forgets.

I cannot keep Kotev forever, having another adult male here is a problem.  But there is no way he will go to anyone that has not proven to be worthy of a dog like him…