''Cujo'' is a 1983 American

horror film Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes. Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include monsters, ap ...

based on

Stephen King Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, crime, science-fiction, and fantasy novels. Described as the "King of Horror", a play on his surname and a reference to his high s ...

's 1981 novel of the same name and directed by Lewis Teague. It was written by Don Carlos Dunaway and Barbara Turner (using the pen name Lauren Currier), and starring

Dee Wallace Deanna Wallace (née Bowers; born December 14, 1948), also known as Dee Wallace Stone, is an American actress. She is perhaps best known for her role as Mary Taylor, the mother in the 1982 blockbuster film '' E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial''. She i ...

, Daniel Hugh Kelly and

Danny Pintauro Danny Pintauro (born January 6, 1976) is an American actor and film producer. He starred in the sitcom '' Who's the Boss?'' and the 1983 horror film ''Cujo''. Early life Pintauro was born in Milltown, New Jersey, the son of John J. Pintauro, a m ...

. The film follows a mother and her son who are trapped inside their car, while protecting themselves from a rabid St. Bernard. Despite mixed reviews and modest box office receipts during its theatrical release, the film has gathered a

cult following A cult following refers to a group of fans who are highly dedicated to some person, idea, object, movement, or work, often an artist, in particular a performing artist, or an artwork in some medium. The lattermost is often called a cult classic. ...

in the years since its release. It was released four months before ''

Christine Christine may refer to: People * Christine (name), a female given name Film * ''Christine'' (1958 film), based on Schnitzler's play ''Liebelei'' * ''Christine'' (1983 film), based on King's novel of the same name * ''Christine'' (1987 fil ...

'', another Stephen King story released theatrically the same year.

Plot

Cujo, a friendly and easygoing St. Bernard, chases a wild

rabbit Rabbits, also known as bunnies or bunny rabbits, are small mammals in the family Leporidae (which also contains the hares) of the order Lagomorpha (which also contains the pikas). ''Oryctolagus cuniculus'' includes the European rabbit sp ...

and inserts his head into a cave, where a

rabid Rabies is a viral disease that causes encephalitis in humans and other mammals. Early symptoms can include fever and tingling at the site of exposure. These symptoms are followed by one or more of the following symptoms: nausea, vomiting, ...

bat bites him on the nose. Meanwhile, the Trenton family — advertising executive Vic, housewife Donna, and their sensitive young son Tad — take their car to the rural home of abusive mechanic Joe Camber for some repairs, where they meet Cujo, the Camber family's pet, and get along well with him. Donna notices Cujo's bitten nose but thinks little of it. Later, Vic and Donna's marriage is tested when Vic learns that Donna is having an affair with her ex-boyfriend from high school, Steve Kemp, while Vic's advertising for a cereal commercial is failing. The early signs of Cujo's infection start to appear, including sensitivity to loud noises, and fraying temper producing soft growls, but no one notices these changes in his behavior. Charity and Brett, Joe's wife and son, leave the house for a week to visit Charity's sister Holly. On the morning of their departure, the furious stage of the infection begins to set in; though Cujo refrains from attacking Brett, he soon goes completely mad and kills the Cambers' alcoholic neighbor Gary Pervier. Shortly afterwards, Joe goes to Gary's house and finds him dead, then tries to call the authorities just before Cujo appears and attacks him. Vic goes out of town on a business trip, as Donna and Tad return to the Cambers' house for more car repairs. Cujo attacks them, and they are forced to take shelter in their

Ford Pinto The Ford Pinto is a subcompact car that was manufactured and marketed by Ford Motor Company in North America from 1971 until 1980 model years. The Pinto was the first subcompact vehicle produced by Ford in North America. The Pinto was marketed ...

. Donna tries to drive home, but the car's

alternator An alternator is an electrical generator that converts mechanical energy to electrical energy in the form of alternating current. For reasons of cost and simplicity, most alternators use a rotating magnetic field with a stationary armature.Gor ...

dies and the two are trapped inside. The hot sun makes conditions nearly unbearable, and Donna realizes that she must do something before they both die from

heatstroke Heat stroke or heatstroke, also known as sun stroke, is a severe heat illness that results in a body temperature greater than , along with red skin, headache, dizziness, and confusion. Sweating is generally present in exertional heatstroke, b ...

dehydration In physiology, dehydration is a lack of total body water, with an accompanying disruption of metabolic processes. It occurs when free water loss exceeds free water intake, usually due to exercise, disease, or high environmental temperature. Mil ...

. However, attempts at escape are foiled by Cujo repeatedly attacking the car, breaking a window in the process, and even biting Donna. Vic returns home to rekindle his marriage, only to find Donna and Tad missing and his house vandalized by Kemp. He suspects the possessive Kemp of kidnapping, but the police realize his wife and son might be at the Cambers house. The local sheriff, George Bannerman, arrives at the mechanics house and has a brief standoff; before he can draw his gun, Cujo kills him, knocking him off the catwalk in the barn and mauling him to death. Later, Donna attempts to get to the house to bring a dehydrated and overheated Tad water but is stopped by Cujo; she fights him off with a

baseball bat A baseball bat is a smooth wooden or metal club used in the sport of baseball to hit the ball after it is thrown by the pitcher. By regulation it may be no more than in diameter at the thickest part and no more than in length. Although histor ...

until it breaks, leaving only a jagged handle. Cujo jumps at her and is impaled in the

stomach The stomach is a muscular, hollow organ in the gastrointestinal tract of humans and many other animals, including several invertebrates. The stomach has a dilated structure and functions as a vital organ in the digestive system. The stomach i ...

by the broken bat. Donna takes the sheriff's gun and contemplates shooting him, but decides saving Tad is more important. After Donna revives Tad inside the kitchen, Cujo, still alive, breaks through the kitchen window and tries to attack Donna. However, Donna shoots Cujo dead before Vic arrives and reunites with his family.

Cast

as Donna Trenton *

as Tad Trenton * Daniel Hugh-Kelly as Vic Trenton * Christopher Stone as Steve Kemp * Ed Lauter as Joe Camber *

Kaiulani Lee Kaiulani Lee is an American actress. She is best known for her portrayal of Rachel Carson in both the film and stage version of ''A Sense of Wonder'', which she also wrote. Career Lee is also a well-known stage, television, and film actress. She ...

as Charity Camber * Billy Jacoby as Brett Camber * Mills Watson as Gary Pervier *

Jerry Hardin Jerry Hardin (born November 20, 1929) is an American actor. Hardin has appeared in film and television roles, including the character nicknamed Deep Throat in ''The X-Files''. Hardin was born in Texas and studied acting at London's Royal Acade ...

as Masen *

Sandy Ward Sandy Brown (July 12, 1926 – March 6, 2005) was an American film and television actor. He was perhaps best known for playing the recurring role of "Logger Pete" on 11 episodes of the American sitcom television series ''Malcolm in the Middle''. ...

as Sheriff George Bannerman * Arthur Rosenberg as Roger Breakstone

Production

The original director was Peter Medak, who left the project two days into filming, along with DOP

Anthony B. Richmond Anthony Barry Richmond British Society of Cinematographers, BSC, American Society of Cinematographers, ASC (born 7 July 1942) is an English cinematographer, film producer, and director. He is known for his collaborations with Nicolas Roeg, whic ...

. They were replaced by Lewis Teague and Jan de Bont respectively. Cujo was played by four St. Bernards, several mechanical dogs, and a black Labrador-Great Dane mix in a St. Bernard costume. In some shots, stuntman Gary Morgan played Cujo while wearing a large dog costume. Karl Miller was the trainer for the dogs in Cujo.

Reception

Box office

''Cujo'' was a modest box office success for Warner Brothers. The film was released August 12, 1983, in the United States, opening in second place that weekend. It grossed a total of $21,156,152 domestically, making it the fourth-highest-grossing horror film of 1983 behind '' Jaws 3-D'', '' Psycho II'', and '' Twilight Zone: The Movie''.

Critical response

Reviews from critics were mixed.

Janet Maslin Janet R. Maslin (born August 12, 1949) is an American journalist, best known as a film and literary critic for ''The New York Times''. She served as a ''Times'' film critic from 1977 to 1999 and as a book critic from 2000 to 2015. In 2000 Maslin ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' wrote the film was "by no means a horror classic, but it's suspenseful and scary". ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' panned it as "a dull, uneventful entry in the horror genre, a film virtually devoid of surprises or any original suspense".

Gene Siskel Eugene Kal Siskel (January 26, 1946 – February 20, 1999) was an American film critic and journalist for the '' Chicago Tribune''. Along with colleague Roger Ebert, he hosted a series of movie review programs on television from 1975 until his ...

of the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...

'' gave the film one star out of four, calling it "one of the dumbest, flimsiest excuses for a movie I have ever seen".

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

called it "dreadful", and Linda Gross of the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...

'' wrote that "no theater is air conditioned enough to justify watching this scary, gory and beastly movie". Steve Jenkins of ''

The Monthly Film Bulletin ''The Monthly Film Bulletin'' was a periodical of the British Film Institute published monthly from February 1934 to April 1991, when it merged with ''Sight & Sound''. It reviewed all films on release in the United Kingdom, including those with a ...

'' wrote that "for the most part ''Cujo'' works very effectively as a near reductio ad absurdum of the woman-in-peril-mode", but disliked that the film changed the ending from the book, thinking it made "absolutely no sense in terms of the film's logic". Author and film critic

Leonard Maltin Leonard Michael Maltin (born December 18, 1950) is an American film critic and film historian, as well as an author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives. He is perhaps best known for his book of fi ...

gave the film three out of a possible four stars, calling it "genuinely frightening" also writing: "Builds slowly but surely to tsterrifying (but not gory) climax". Despite the mixed reception, Stephen King called the film "terrific" and named it one of his favorite adaptations. On review aggregation website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

, it holds a 60% approval rating based on 43 reviews, with the website's consensus stating: "''Cujo'' is artless work punctuated with moments of high canine gore and one wild Dee Wallace performance". On Metacritic, the film holds a 57/100 based on reviews from 8 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Additional adaptation

In 2015, Sunn Classic Pictures announced that it would develop another adaptation titled ''C.U.J.O.'', which stands for "Canine Unit Joint Operations". Nothing came of it after its announcement.

References

External links

* * * * {{Authority control 1983 films 1983 horror films 1980s horror thriller films 1980s monster movies American horror thriller films American monster movies American natural horror films 1980s English-language films Films about animals Films about dogs Films based on American horror novels Films based on works by Stephen King Films directed by Lewis Teague Films scored by Charles Bernstein Films set in Maine Warner Bros. films Rabies in popular culture Taft Entertainment Pictures films 1980s American films