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White Dog
A trainer attempts to retrain a vicious dog that’s been raised to kill black people.
Release : | 1982 |
Rating : | 7 |
Studio : | Paramount, |
Crew : | Production Design, Set Decoration, |
Cast : | Kristy McNichol Paul Winfield Burl Ives Jameson Parker Christa Lang |
Genre : | Drama Horror Thriller |
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From my favorite movies..
Expected more
Absolutely Fantastic
It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny
Story in a nutshell. Girl finds dog. Girl bonds with dog. Girl learns to her horror that dog has been trained to kill black people. Girl finds a black dog trainer who attempts to deprogram dog from killing black people. During his deprogramming, dog escapes from his pen and kills a black man inside a church. Black trainer finds dog and instead of killing it or letting the authorities handle it, takes it back and continues with the deprogramming. Trainer finally believes he has succeeded and calls girl to come and see how far dog has come along. Success! Dog no longer wants to kill black people. Now dog wants to kill fat old Burl Ives'-looking white men. Trainer shoots dog. Dog dies. Why does this movie have seven stars?
I'm only giving this movie 3 stars because I basically like the 3 stars that were in it and enjoyed their performances...from the mild but REALLY "Kristy McNichol" Kristy McNichol performance...to the emotion-on-queue Paul Winfield one...to the UNDER-cast, almost anachronistic Burl Ives one. The rest of the movie...the entire PREMISE of it...garbage. And let me tell ya why! First off...it's real simple: bad dog (of any color or race!) bites someone to the point it draws blood...dead dog. Simple...end of day...end of story. Yet in THIS movie the dog has some kind of 'white privilege'! It gets away with biting people in a bloody frenzy...to outright mauling a man to death...IN A CHURCH...and they STILL want to reform this maniac dog...he's REALLY f'd in the head! All of that is enough to sink this movie into a ridiculous, farcical mound...but it fails on another level. It TOTALLY insults black people and makes them look like completely appeasing, happenstance inconsequential entities that just HAPPEN to exist in a bilaterally-symmetrical world...meaningless. The dog attacks and kills one (1) black man (no one sees this, mind you...OK...understandable)...fine, I get it so far (other than Kristy's bland acting...apparently presented to us in this film off the back of the ratings of 'Family'...or 'Little Darlings' happening to do well??). But black person attacked number two (2)...in plain sight of MANY people...blood drawn from mangled back and, later revealed, arm of a young, female (though black...that nullifies any other descriptor/characteristic) actress...and black person attacked number three (3) in plain sight of the dynamic trio of McNichol, Winfield and Ives?? I mean...DEAD dog!! HOW is this animal STILL alive?? Now attacked black being number four (4)...dead number two (2)...is a DOOZIE!! WHY, you ask? Because attacked/dead black person number 4/2...is killed IN A CHURCH!! This event (apparent aftermath) was also witnessed by someone...the person compelled and COMMITTED to curing the white dog (Winfield). Now I come to the main part of why and how this movie was pathetic and an insult to black people. The head of the now criminal group that allowed the dog to live was Paul Winfield (with Ives and McNichol complicit in a clandestine cabal...knowing FULL well what they were doing...while dining on savory lamb chops)...the black man who saw, with his own eyes, attacked/dead black person number 4/2 viciously killed by this dog to the point where ole' faithful n' emotional Winfield was able to shed a tear...from BOTH eyes...yet STILL wanted to cure this animal...ostensibly to prevent such an animal from existing again. PLEASE tell me how one could ever prevent white dogs or black dogs from existing...and WHY would we ever want to "cure" such an animal that has MURDERED people?? Yet Mr. Winfield's and Mr. Ives's and Ms. McNichol's characters (though, credit to her, McNichol's character FINALLY realized the dog needed a bullet after black man number 4/2) STILL...STILL want to cure this beast (McNichol, seemingly coerced, may get a lesser sentence when the real world swings around). The message I got from this movie...is not ONLY do black lives NOT matter...but they apparently just disappear after they die in this movie (when not gleeful they have actor's guild insurance...oh...no problem with the gashes on the back seemingly requiring stitches and a hospital stay where several bouquets of flowers have been delivered...though this, black person attacked number two (2) WAS under the impression the dog had been "gotten rid of"...which to me would have inferred a final trip to the pound). Black man dies in a fiery collision with a paint store after being chewed driving and screaming by a racist, paratroop-jumping attack dog...knowing when to bail EXACTLY at the right time. Black man gets mauled to death in a church...dog gets cheeseburger. Um...one question...WHERE ARE THE DETECTIVES??? The movie TOTALLY ignores this and makes it look like these black men that were murdered in such dramatic fashions and in such odd, highly-notable settings (a church and a blown-up paint store) were totally expendable, unimportant phenomena...just moving creatures that happen to have two arms and two legs and a head. And Winfield's character MUST have actually tampered with evidence at a crime scene and moved the dead, black body from the church...ALL to rehabilitate a poor canine traumatized by a white supremacist as a puppy. Um...DEAD DOG! So Winfield is basically accessory to a murder (remember...the dog should have LONG SINCE been dead when it escaped from his care and murdered yet another person...Winfield MUST have later cleaned up...but WHERE did he take the body? Oh, I forgot...dead, black bodies just disappear in this movie/movie's world!)...and, btw, what was this a ghost town...nobody on the street but one black man in a business suit (doing what??) who runs in a church with no parishioners or pastor? Crazy. Well...long story short we cure the dog now. Only one problem...he's Damien Omen K-9 now. He doesn't know who NOT to attack...and is FINALLY killed by black man/Winfield...but ONLY when he (crazy dog was never even given a name...maybe THAT'S why he was wacko) attacks white man/Ives. Black man degraded throughout the entire movie...but STILL loyal enough to protect white man. Where have we seen THIS narrative before? This movie was just SO wrong on SO many levels. I saw it as a child and didn't realize the nonsense I was watching. It just couldn't have been made better because the ENTIRE premise of trying to save a murderous dog to prevent one from ever existing again (an impossibility) just makes no sense in ANY dimension...MAYBE one where time goes backward...whereby the dog could have been trained in the future not to kill the people it did/does/would have in the past...WHATEVER...but...not like this (in my female 'Matrix' victim's voice)...not like this. Oh and I would LOVE to see a 'White Dog II'...where they start to investigate the murders! Winfield's character better PRAY they didn't/don't have luminol back then!! ALL three of you are going to JAIL!! Dead Movie!
White Dog is a polarizing, criminally underrated commentary on racism as a curable way of thinking. The most dehumanizing thing you could do to a race is view them as stereotypical caricatures and writer-director Samuel Fuller recognized this when he made this film. Therefore, to tell his unconventional story, he utilizes characters as metaphors and events as psychiatric tests, beautifully articulating the theory that a racist can be "rebirthed," so to speak, as someone who holds no judgments.One of the many reasons to appreciate this film is - unlike so many pictures today - this one possesses the courage and gumption to take an idea and gleefully run with it. Samuel Fuller holds up a magnifying glass to his audience, questioning their prejudices and tests their understanding and belief in racist behavior - can it be "cured" or is it there to stay after initial implementation? Fuller uses a beautiful, healthy white German Sheppard as the main character - or device - to try and give substance and justification to these questions. The dog is of an older age and is struck by Julie Sawyer (Kristy McNichol), a young, starving actress in search of work. She takes the dog to a vet where it is seen suffering minor injuries. Not long after Julie takes it home with her - as all other options seem to be unfulfilling - she learns her nameless dog is an attack dog, specifically trained to viciously maul black people. Frustrated and low on options, she takes the dog to a black man named Keys (Paul Winfield), who specializes in training animals, particularly dogs. He knows all about "white dogs" and informs Julie that at the age of a puppy this dog may have been beaten and mistreated by a black man (as directed by a white owner) in order to make the dog "attack black before black can attack hit." Julie is disgusted and angry. Her boyfriend believes the dog should be put down, while Julie (who represents the optimistic side of the "learned racism" debate) believes that it isn't the dog's fault that it was trained to hate. Another elderly white trainer named Carruthers (Burl Ives) also believes the dog is untrainable and, on that notion, should be put down.Julie decides to let Keys do his best to try and make the dog relearn. What follows is terrific and lengthy sequences of Keys trying to retrain the dog and overwrite its memory. All the while, we, the viewer, are put in a position where numerous questions have already been quietly communicated to us and we have to come up with answers in our head. White Dog challenges the viewer in a mystifying way that is equal parts subtle, manipulative, and brilliant. The film plays with your emotions, but never shamelessly milks the material as sentimental bait.The only thing that will likely serve as a distraction to viewers are the film's production values, which are obviously cheap and of an independent film budget. However, when a film is this crowded with blunt social commentary and heavy themes, questioning a person's true beliefs and ethics, production values have little importance whatsoever. Few will complain because the film provides such a smooth conversation on racism that the way it is presented doesn't need to be very polished. I'd rather have a low-budget piece of valuable commentary than a glossy, good-looking film with no brain in its head whatsoever.Racism is a tough subject to tackle in film, and with directors like Paul Haggis unintentionally cheapening the material for easy-consumption and others like Spike Lee clearly passionate about making it believable, a film like White Dog is a true miracle. Fuller's approach to racism and the blunt question it asks a person shouldn't be ignored. We're told in the film that dogs can only see in two colors; what happens when one of them is viewed as an evil color? Starring: Kristy McNichol, Paul Winfield, Burl Ives, and Jameson Parker. Directed by: Samuel Fuller.
In Los Angeles, the unemployed young actress Julie Sawyer (Kristy McNichol) hits a white German Sheppard while driving though the hills during the night. She brings the dog to the veterinary and keeps the animal in her house on the hills. Julie takes a picture of the dog and distributes fliers with her boyfriend seeking out the owner.When a burglar and rapist breaks in her house, the dog protects Julie and she decides to keep the animal with her. But sooner she learns the white dog is an animal trained by a racist to attack black people. However Julie has become attached to the dog and tries to find a trainer for "deprogramming" the dog. She goes to the Noah Ark, a place where the Afro-American trainer of wild animals Keys (Paul Winfield) accepts the challenge despite the difficulties of his task. "White Dog" is among the most impressive films about racism ever made by the cinema history. The plot is very simple but touching and shows how cruel and intolerant a human being can be. The sick idea of using alcoholic or addicted black man to frequently beat up a puppy until it grows-up with hatred of black people is so despicable that it is hard to believe that it may happen. I saw this film for the first time in the 80's and it has not aged. My vote is sight.Title (Brazil): "Cão Branco" ("White Dog")