Roderick Gauci
Stunt Coordinator
- Joined
- Mar 3, 2002
- Messages
- 165
I wish Martin Blythe or someone at Paramount could comment on the actual status of this film.
I have just watched it for the first time (on Italian TV), and I have to say outright that I really don’t see it as a racist picture at all! On the contrary, it deals extremely tactfully with its delicate subject matter, and nowhere does it condone such outdated (to say nothing of despicable) views.
WHITE DOG was the iconoclastic director’s last Hollywood film - and one of his most remarkable, in my opinion - but it was never released to theaters in the U.S., forcing Fuller to take it to Europe instead! Twenty years after the fact, I should think Paramount has had enough time to reconsider and see fit to accommodate this important motion picture an official release, at least on DVD. One perhaps tends to forget that, hand in hand with the racial angle, the film also tackles another very sensitive issue: animal cruelty. This is also handled very well, especially in the scene near the end when the dog’s previous (racist) owner appears on the scene to claim it back.
Despite the violence it commits, the dog is never portrayed as a ‘monster’ that should be destroyed like the ones we encounter in conventional horror films. However, it does carry undeniable connotations with the genre, and especially with R.L. Stevenson’s perennial DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE: like the leading character of that story, the dog seems to register two diverse and entirely opposing personalities - docile, protective and even playful with its mistress (Kristy McNichol), but then suddenly turning into an unstoppable beast out for blood whenever a colored person crosses its path!
The ‘reconditioning’ scenes with Paul Winfield are exceptional, and really give one an idea of what trained animals have to go through before they finally learn to ‘perform’. The rather bleak final scene (so typical of Fuller) is especially powerful - and poignant.
I truly hope that we will soon see this fascinating and thought-provoking film get a decent release on DVD: Fuller is criminally under-represented in this format, but it no doubt ought to be made available as well for its valid sociological aspects - which it does not exploit for sensationalistic value, but rather aims for maximum eloquence with a direct, realistic style that really should not offend anybody!
I have just watched it for the first time (on Italian TV), and I have to say outright that I really don’t see it as a racist picture at all! On the contrary, it deals extremely tactfully with its delicate subject matter, and nowhere does it condone such outdated (to say nothing of despicable) views.
WHITE DOG was the iconoclastic director’s last Hollywood film - and one of his most remarkable, in my opinion - but it was never released to theaters in the U.S., forcing Fuller to take it to Europe instead! Twenty years after the fact, I should think Paramount has had enough time to reconsider and see fit to accommodate this important motion picture an official release, at least on DVD. One perhaps tends to forget that, hand in hand with the racial angle, the film also tackles another very sensitive issue: animal cruelty. This is also handled very well, especially in the scene near the end when the dog’s previous (racist) owner appears on the scene to claim it back.
Despite the violence it commits, the dog is never portrayed as a ‘monster’ that should be destroyed like the ones we encounter in conventional horror films. However, it does carry undeniable connotations with the genre, and especially with R.L. Stevenson’s perennial DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE: like the leading character of that story, the dog seems to register two diverse and entirely opposing personalities - docile, protective and even playful with its mistress (Kristy McNichol), but then suddenly turning into an unstoppable beast out for blood whenever a colored person crosses its path!
The ‘reconditioning’ scenes with Paul Winfield are exceptional, and really give one an idea of what trained animals have to go through before they finally learn to ‘perform’. The rather bleak final scene (so typical of Fuller) is especially powerful - and poignant.
I truly hope that we will soon see this fascinating and thought-provoking film get a decent release on DVD: Fuller is criminally under-represented in this format, but it no doubt ought to be made available as well for its valid sociological aspects - which it does not exploit for sensationalistic value, but rather aims for maximum eloquence with a direct, realistic style that really should not offend anybody!
