Cujo (1983) [25th Anniversary Edition] – DVD

*½/**** Image A- Sound A- Extras B
starring Dee Wallace, Daniel Hugh-Kelly, Danny Pintauro, Ed Lauter
screenplay by Don Carlos Dunaway and Lauren Currier, based on the novel by Stephen King
directed by Lewis Teague

by Travis Mackenzie Hoover It takes more than Lewis Teague to make a St. Bernard scary. His awkward, lifeless adaptation of one of Stephen King's less celebrated high-period novels is so thoroughly incapable of rendering its central "monster" even slightly disturbing that the end result is more hilarious than horrifying. What's worse is that Teague isn't good for much else in this movie, either: the extended set-up to Cujo's rabies rampage is completely lacking in style or subtext, leaving the occasional titter to be had during the climax as hollow compensation. The director is clearly treating this as a bread job, what with every story beat pursued apathetically and the loaded (if banal) violation of middle-class home and hearth left unexamined. King has peddled some pretty awful ideas in his day, but at least he can be said to have conviction.

It's not difficult to see why King seized on St. Bernards as his homicidal dog of choice. Nobody would suspect such a big, shaggy, lovable animal of doing anything remotely harmful, especially to young children, meaning this particular breed has exactly the sort of cuddly iconography that Maine's favourite son lives to defile in graphic detail. In truth, the idea is simple and obvious, but the point is you could expect King to attack it with sweaty gusto–and we in turn would be horrified not so much by the concept but by the insane earnestness with which the author enjoys it. (Although I haven't read Cujo, he pulled that stunt often enough that it's a reasonable assumption.) I also suspect that the killer St. Bernard described is a hell of a lot more credible than the one photographically represented: where the imagination can embellish the pooch into some kind of primal force, you have to be a virtuoso to dress up a goofy-looking trained dog to seem anything other than ridiculous on the big screen.

Admittedly, I've described stumbling blocks, not guarantees of failure–that is, not if you're someone smarter than Lewis Teague, who strips away the passion and sillies up the monster while also managing to kill any thematic resonance in the surrounding narrative. It wouldn't be hard–especially in the eighties–to read something into the great cloud hanging over the Spielbergian bourgeoisie at the centre of Cujo: self-sacrificing mother Donna Trenton (Dee Wallace, in her archetypal role) and her husband Vic (Daniel Hugh-Kelly), an adman consciously, guiltily selling poisonous sugar cereal. When the corporate malfeasance is revealed, alas, it registers as a mere plot point. Similarly, Donna's affair with one Steve Kemp (Christopher Stone) generates zero heat and barely relates the fact that Donna is bored in her new small-town existence. Rather, it just foreshadows Steve being a jerk later on and facilitates the family reunion transparently coming down the pike.

About forty minutes pass without a witty line or an attractive shot. There's a bit of intrigue with redneck mechanic Joe Camber (Ed Lauter), who works on Donna's car AND owns the eponymous killer, yet he's ultimately a cipher in every way that matters. And so we wait for Cujo–bitten by a bat in the first scene and looking progressively soggy in a gesture towards rabid-ization–to go postal and take out his master. By all rights, we should be on tenterhooks once Cujo ambushes a stalled vehicle containing Donna and her five-year-old son Tad (Danny Pintauro), which creates a tantalizing amount of negative space between our heroes and their house. A talented director would use these parameters to generate a tactile sensation or visual metaphor; Teague gives you a wet dog. Though Wallace and Pintauro do an admirable job of screaming, the tension ain't there–the Griffith-style intercutting of Vic rushing home to see what's happening be damned. There's a plot, a climax, and a resolution, but that's all you can really say for a movie that doesn't have anything on its mind beyond lumbering to a foregone conclusion.

THE DVD
Prematurely commemorating the film's 25^th Anniversary, Lionsgate's/Maple's DVD reissue of Cujo is perfectly adequate. The 1.85:1, 16×9-enhanced presentation looks about as good as the boring visuals will allow: while there's no real life to the cinematography (this despite Jan de Bont serving as DP), the transfer is very vivid in replicating the muted palette without sacrificing too much in terms of detail. Somehow, one wouldn't want it to be inhumanly razor-sharp, and the image strikes the right balance. The Dolby 2.0 monaural sound is also strong, with a sharp potent character that serves the dialogue-and-bad-music elements quite well. Extras begin with a game feature-length commentary from Teague wherein the filmmaker calls Cujo the best of his features due to the high quality of such collaborators as de Bont and editor Neil Travis, both of whom are singled out for their invaluable contributions. Teague's generosity aside, his explication of "real fear vs. imaginary fear" is a testament to the unexamined premises that litter the movie.

Alas, much of what he says is repeated practically verbatim in "Dog Days: The Making of Cujo" (42 mins.), a three-part making-of doc by Laurent Bouzereau more or less split up into prep, production, and post that covers, through interviews with surviving cast and crew, topics like Teague's tortuous road to landing the job, the five dogs and several fake heads needed to pull off the climax, and the jell of personalities involved in the production. Still, in spite of a clear attempt to cover all the bases, the featurette's insights are roughly as penetrating as those found in the movie itself; a lot of vague praise mingles with precious little analysis. Completing the package are trailers for Bug, The Condemned, Stephen King's Desperation, Rottweiler, and the fifth season of "The Dead Zone".

95 minutes; R; 1.85:1 (16×9-enhanced); English DD DD 2.0 (Mono); CC; English, Spanish subtitles; DVD-9; Region One; Lionsgate/Maple