White Dog

There's a tragic truth to the premise of Samuel Fuller's often overlooked (or, more accurately, largely unseen) film, White Dog, which isn't so much revealed via subtle metaphor as a smack-you-in-the-face cornerstone of the movie's overall reason to exist. And the relevancy stretches far beyond the America it was born into. 
Put simply, the plot centres on Julie Sawyer (Kristie McNichol), a young woman who accidentally runs down the eponymous hound. Quite literally wrapped in stunning white fur, little does she know the dog is also a White Dog-proper; basically a fanged K9 classically conditioned by racist owners to attack African Americans. It's not long before the truth outs, though, with an incident involving her friend followed by a visit to an animal training centre used by movie and advert directors. Agreeing to the challenge, the professionals have the huge task of trying to un-train the animal. 
To avoid any real spoilers let's leave it there. It should go without saying that the White Dog in question represents society, which in the eyes of Fuller is inherently prejudice and xenophobic. Without intervention and one-on-one attention it's impossible for these attitudes to change, yet the method of therapy itself threatens to send our already universally unhinged minds over the edge, driven as they have been to the brink of madness by years of propaganda, learned ignorance and forced intolerance. Not exactly an ideal watch if you're already feeling emotionally battered. 
Nevertheless it remains an important piece of work, and for more reasons than content alone. Suppressed prior to release in the U.S. by Paramount Pictures, although White Dog saw the light of day in Britain and France as planned circa 1982, across the Atlantic people had to wait until 2008 for a look, when it finally arrived uncut on DVD. The paranoia surrounding the message arguably betrays the notoriously close-minded attitude of major American studios, and exposes the predominantly white, patriarchal point of view on the part of those in charge.
Not that we really want to point fingers. 
Of course there are criticisms you could make of the movie itself. But, despite looking and feeling its age, the tension and atmosphere of inevitable grisliness that result from the director's vision and realisation serve to create what could well be the most nail-biting and poignant flick ever to focus on a four-legged friend, or rather enemy. Now remastered and re-released on DVD and Blu-ray, it's definitely one for the collectors.