Review of White Dog (1982) by Chris K — 03 Jan 2010

A beautiful and tragic film which has some of the most ludicrous dialogue, story and acting I have ever seen. This is a ridiculous story, it is full of holes and what not but may I highlight the stupidity of one scene, the street sweep. I mean really, what the hell, a dog leaps into a street sweeper somehow kills the driver and then the driver somehow drives, apparently his foot got stuck or something, through like 7 clothing stores. Why is this scene in the movie AT ALL? And why is the motor vehicle focused on so dynamically when it hits the building?

A couple aspects of the story are dealt with in a sort of awkward and banal way, such as when the dog trainer is explaining to the actress, the reasons for this dog's behavior, it's the most obvious and idiotic way I have seen a filmmaker attempt the "establish" his themes. It is even unnecessary almost, when the actress meets the park owner the events in that scene effectively set up the ideas of the story, it's like Fuller just had to literally explain it or something ,in the scene I was previously talking about. In one of the last sequences, when the actress meets the owner of the dog and kids, the pacing/relevance/acting are just random. The only reason I can see behind it is an explanation for "white dog's" attack on the park owner, the dog thought he was the same person as his previous owner who beat him?

With all that said there are some beautiful moments. The portrait of the wounded dog as it lies in the arena, the use of slow-motion, the use of ZOOM, are all completely stunning. Apparently the script was hammered out in 10 days and on an overly right schedule the film was made, so that explains why artist need there time.