Cujo, 1983.
Directed by Lewis Teague.
Starring Dee Wallace, Daniel Hugh Kelly, Danny Pintauro, Ed Lauter, Christopher Stone, and Sandy Ward.
SYNOPSIS:
Cujo, a friendly St. Bernard, contracts rabies and conducts a reign of terror on an American farm.
Just in time for Halloween, Arrow Video bring Lewis Teague’s 1983 adaptation of Stephen King’s Cujo to 4K UHD in a bumper extras-filled package, but given how much King’s work has been in the mainstream in recent years, does this older movie still hold up?
Cujo is a St. Bernard who belongs to Joe Camber (Ed Lauter), a bad-tempered mechanic who lives on a farm with his wife and son. One day, Cujo chases a rabbit through fields and forests, until the rabbit disappears into a hole. Poking his nose in where it doesn’t belong, Cujo is bitten by a bat carrying rabies, and very soon the friendly dog starts to show symptoms of the deadly disease.
Taking her car to Camber to be fixed, Donna Trenton (Dee Wallace) and her young son Tad (Danny Pintauro) become trapped when the car breaks down altogether on the farm and Cujo becomes rabid, stalking the yard and attacking Donna every time she tries to escape. With her husband Vic (Daniel Hugh Kelly) out of town after he discovered her affair with their friend Steve (Christopher Stone), Donna is left alone to protect Tad and fight for survival in the car as the weather heats up and dehydration kicks in.
Taking the classic monster movie template and making the monster a family pet – albeit one that cannot help what it is doing – Cujo veers quite significantly from its source material, and if you’ve read the book then you know that it had to because it is a major studio production and the majority of the audience would be going to the cinema to watch a horror movie not prepared for the tragic family drama that Stephen King wove into his story. Luckily, screenwriters Don Carlos Dunaway and Barbara Turner (writing as Lauren Currier) stripped away some of the fat, reduced the number of characters and changed the ending to something more palatable for mainstream audiences looking for a creepy fright rather than a depressing melodrama.
By doing that, Cujo turns in at 92 minutes which, by Stephen King movie standards, is relatively short but still there are points where it feels a little padded and the pacing is off. The main plot is Donna and Tad trapped in their car while Cujo waits for them, and that doesn’t happen until nearly 50 minutes in, by which point we’ve spent time with Donna, Vic and their marriage problems, plus we also have to have the setup of Mrs. Camber and her son leaving the house for a break away from the abusive Joe, which takes up more time than it needs to and doesn’t really have any payoff other than them not being at the farm to help Donna.
Despite Donna being a heroic mum protecting her child, you also have to consider that she is a cheating wife and not an especially sympathetic character, although she does get some sympathy once Cujo attacks as being stuck in a car with a whining 6-year-old isn’t pleasant and is even less so when that child is Danny Pintauro, who is clearly doing what he is being asked to by the director but there occasions when his crying makes you cheer on Cujo to hurry up and break through the door. Yes, it’s wrong on all levels to think it but it is quite irritating to listen to.
However, ignoring the sobbing child and the dubious characteristics of Donna, Dee Wallace gives a winning performance as a mother who will protect her son no matter what (even though she also tires of his constant whinging at one point, as all hope seems to be fading), and along with some excellent special effects and dizzying camerawork, there is just about enough to lift Cujo out of the realms of second-tier Stephen King adaptations. Granted, it isn’t up there with Brian De Palma’s Carrie or Tobe Hooper’s Salem’s Lot but it is probably languishing somewhere around the bottom end of the ‘better ones’ league table, and never has a rabid dog been better edited on film than here, as Cujo always looks great in his slobbery makeup. The filmmakers actually used four different dogs, several mechanical models and even a stuntman in a dog costume but, to be honest, you have to look hard to find it as the quick edits and camera angles combine to make the attack scenes work tremendously well.
Coming on a two-disc set, the 4K UHD disc contains the Theatrical Cut of the movie and several archive extras, including interviews with Dee Wallace, stuntman Gary Morgan (who wore the dog suit), composer Charles Bernstein and several other crew members. There is also a round-table discussion with Dee Wallace, Danny Pintauro, Daniel Hugh Kelly and director Lewis Teague, three audio commentaries featuring Lewis Teague, Jeff McKay and film historian Lee Gambin, Dog Days: The Making of Cujo documentary from 2007 and trailers, so there is plenty to get stuck into but nothing newer than 2019. The second disc is a standard Blu-ray and features the International Cut of the movie, which is only a couple of minutes longer and doesn’t add anything of great weight, plus you get an interview with the very learned author and critic Kim Newman and a 2015 Q&A with Dee Wallace from Cinemaniacs & Monster Fest.
Overall, this 4K UHD edition of Cujo is a stacked package but most of the material has been made available elsewhere on previous releases so if you already own one of those versions you will probably be double-dipping on the special features as well as the movie. However, if you are double-dipping the UHD upgrade is worth it as it is noticeably better than any previous Blu-ray release, with grain still intact and a warmth to the picture that, thankfully, hasn’t been scrubbed out in the restoration process – just check out the shot of Cujo sat watching the car as the sun sits low in the sky for how gorgeous it can look. If you don’t already own it, then needless to say this is the version to get as it is unlikely the movie will ever look better than it does here, and although it doesn’t have every featurette ever made about the film it does contain everything you will ever need to know, so over 40 years later Cujo is still a decent Stephen King adaptation whose best moments haven’t really diminished over time – unlike other movies from that stable – making it ripe for (re)discovery.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Chris Ward
