Its interior scenes were shot at Biograph's studio facilities in New York City, and its exteriors were filmed on location in Coytesville, today one of the oldest communities in Fort Lee, New Jersey.

[1] The story, set in the late 1800s, is a cross-cultural melodrama about Gladys Penrose (Florence Lawrence), a young white woman who rejects the professed love of George Redfeather (Charles Inslee).

In recognition of George's scholastic and athletic achievements, Gladys's father, a lieutenant in the United States Army, holds a formal reception and dance for the local "hero".

[5] Back with his "own people", George agitates a small group of his fellow braves with a fiery speech and bottles of whiskey, and then, after becoming inebriated, he returns by himself to the town to spy on Gladys and to observe her activities.

The scenes inside Lieutenant Penrose's home and in George's bedroom were filmed at Biograph's New York studio, which was situated in a large converted brownstone residence at 11 East 14th Street in Manhattan.

In its October 31 issue that year, the New York-based trade journal The Moving Picture World provides an additional overview of the short's plot as well as a concise assessment of its presentation.

The Morning Astorian, for example, in Astoria, Oregon, also summarizes the short's plot in its November 18 edition and then urges its readers to see the film before its run at the local Grand Theatre ends:The picture tells a story of a young Indian who gained fame as a hero in a college football game.

The Indian falls in love with the young lady and asks her to become his wife; she refuses, he then becomes desperate and responds to "the call of the wild" where he rejoins his own kind and seeks to forget his sorrow with over-indulgence in firewater.The picture is intensely interesting and exciting throughout and is probably one of the best seen in this city for some time.

[9] Submitted by Biograph to the United States government shortly before the film's release, the roll of paper prints is part of the original documentation required by federal authorities when motion-picture companies applied for copyright protection for their productions.

In fact, during the 1950s and early 1960s, Kemp R. Niver and other LOC staff restored more than 3,000 such paper rolls in the library's collection and transferred many of them, including The Call of the Wild, to safety stock.