PopHorror Let's Get Scared
Tuesday: Cujo (1983) & White Dog (1982)
It’s Tuesday and the work week has already got you as sick as a dog, I’m sure. So we’re gonna feed into that feeling with a pair of deadly dog movies. The first is Lewis Teague’s taut, high-octane survival thriller, Cujo. Cujo is a lovable Saint Bernard until he catches rabies and becomes a nightmare. In Teague’s film, the dog becomes a metaphor for families. The protagonist, Donna (Dee Wallace), must face all of the ways she risked her own family as she stares down a beloved pet turned killing machine. The metaphor is subtle, however, as Teague flexes most of his directorial muscle to build suspense and create a power struggle between woman and beast.
Not so subtle, though, is Samuel Fuller’s political screed, White Dog. The film follows a young actress, Julie (Kristy McNichol), who finds a stray white German Shepherd. She quickly forms a bond with the dog until she learns a terrible secret: the dog has been trained to attack black people. Only black people. White Dog becomes more about battling White America’s problematic sympathy for its own racism as black animal trainer Keys (Paul Winfield) battles to fix the dog’s broken, racist brain. In Cujo, the dog becomes monster from nature. In White Dog, it’s nurture. It’s up to you, Tuesday Double Featurers, to decide which is more terrifying.
