Never Cry Wolf is a 1983 American drama film directed by Carroll Ballard. The film is an adaptation of Farley Mowat's 1963 "subjective non-fiction" book of the same name. The film stars Charles Martin Smith as a government biologist sent into the wilderness to study the caribou population, whose decline is believed to be caused by wolves, even though no one has seen a wolf kill a caribou. The film also features Brian Dennehy and Zachary Ittimangnaq. It was the first Disney film to be released by the studio under the renamed Walt Disney Pictures label. The film was released on October 7, 1983, for a limited distribution, and in the regular theaters on January 27, 1984.