White Dog

Samuel Fuller’s throat-grabbing exposé on American racism was misunderstood and withheld from release when it was made in the early eighties; today, the notorious film is lauded for its daring metaphor and gripping pulp filmmaking. Kristy McNichol stars as a young actress who adopts a lost German shepherd, only to discover through a series of horrifying incidents that the dog has been trained to attack black people, and Paul Winfield plays the animal trainer who tries to cure him. A snarling, uncompromising vision, White Dog is a tragic portrait of the evil done by that most corruptible of animals: the human being.

United States
1982
90 minutes
Color
1.78:1
English
Spine #455

Special Features

New, restored high-definition digital transfer of the uncut version, approved by producer Jon Davison
New video interviews with producer Davison, co-writer Curtis Hanson, and Sam Fuller’s widow, Christa Lang-Fuller
An interview with dog trainer Karl Lewis-Miller
Rare photos from the film’s production
English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
PLUS: New essays by critics J. Hoberman and Armond White, plus a rare 1982 interview in which Fuller interviews the canine star of the film

New cover by Eric Skillman

DVD 1 Disc Currently Unavailable SRP: $29.95

Special Features

New, restored high-definition digital transfer of the uncut version, approved by producer Jon Davison
New video interviews with producer Davison, co-writer Curtis Hanson, and Sam Fuller’s widow, Christa Lang-Fuller
An interview with dog trainer Karl Lewis-Miller
Rare photos from the film’s production
English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
PLUS: New essays by critics J. Hoberman and Armond White, plus a rare 1982 interview in which Fuller interviews the canine star of the film

New cover by Eric Skillman

Cast & Credits

Cast

Kristy McNichol: Julie Sawyer
Paul Winfield: Keys
Burl Ives: Carruthers
Jameson Parker: Roland Gray
Lynne Moody: Molly
Marshall Thompson: Director
Christa Lang: Nurse
Samuel Fuller: Charlie Felton
Hans: Dogs
Folsom
Son
Buster
Duke

Credits

Director: Samuel Fuller
Producer: Jon Davison
Screenplay: Samuel Fuller
Screenplay: Curtis Hanson
Based upon the story by: Romain Gary
Executive producers: Edgar J. Scherick
Executive producers: Nick Vanoff
Cinematography: Bruce Surtees
Production design: Brian Eatwell
Editing: Bernard Gribble
Music: Ennio Morricone
Dogs trained by: Animal Action: Karl Lewis Miller

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Explore

Samuel Fuller

Writer, Director

Crime reporter, freelance journalist, pulp novelist, screenwriter, World War II infantryman—Samuel Fuller was a jack of all trades before the high-school dropout directed his first film at age thirty-six. But once he was contacted by Poverty Row producer Robert L. Lippert, a fan of his writing, Fuller was turned on to cinema—his true calling. A singularly audacious visionary of the B-movie variety, Fuller would make muscular, minuscule pictures, starting with the one-two-three punch of I Shot Jesse James, The Baron of Arizona, and The Steel Helmet—the last a raw Korean War saga that was one of the few films of the period to address racism in America. Soon after, Fuller was scooped up by Twentieth Century Fox, but he was able to maintain his purposefully crude, elegantly stripped-down style and teeth-bared cynicism for such studio efforts as Fixed Bayonets! and Pickup on South Street. Eventually, Fuller returned to independent filmmaking, and in the sixties (after his artistic cred had been given a shot in the arm by the French New Wavers’ embrace of him as a major stylistic influence), he directed two of his most acclaimed titles, the pulpy and profound Shock Corridor and The Naked Kiss, both corrosive satires of American culture. Even in his career’s twilight, Fuller didn’t shy away from controversy: his early eighties social horror film White Dog was shelved by the studio for more than a decade due to its provocative, bloody investigation of American racism.