Good News for all those obsessive cinephiles out there, the December releases from the Criterion Collection have been announced. Even though the high-brow distributor is only giving us two releases in for Xmas, it’s still noteworthy, mostly because it consists of Sam Fuller’s extremely polemic and previously unavailable film (in the United States), “White Dog.” Lars von Trier’s homage to film making techniques of past (Russian experimental, American Film Noir) “Europa,” is also slated to be released in Criterion form this December.
“White Dog”
Released in 1982, this Sam Fuller film incensed liberals (and everyone else) at the time of for its bleak expose of racism in America. Centering around a young woman (’80s teen mainstay Kristy McNichol) who adopts a lost white German Shepard for protection, it soon becomes apparent, through a series of horrifying incidents, that the dog has been trained to attack black people. She then seeks the help of a dog trainer, who happens to be black (good ol’ Paul Winfield, RIP), to curb its aggression. The viewer is set up to see that racism is taught and learned, because even a simpleton, unbiased animal can catch the disease. The movie has never been released on any home video until now, presumably because distributors assumed viewers could not stomach the sight of that cute puppy being abused or a mongrel with a taste for African American behind.
“Europa”
Lars von Trier’s 1991 film which tells the story of a naive and slightly annoying young American who yearns to shove some kindness down some German throats following World War II. He accomplishes this by taking a job as a sleeping car conductor on a German railway network and falling in love with a young German woman who may have something to hide. But it is not before too long that he finds out in his attempt to spread some good ol’ American hospitality he has actually landed him in the middle of a pro-Nazi conspiracy. Even though the film is a tad dense, Von Tier’s thought his Vertov-esque style of shooting merited at least a measly Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, but when he was forced to settle for three other lesser awards, the enfante terrible felt he had no choice but to act like a huge crybaby and storm out of the cinema, while flipping off those ungrateful fucks that dare deem his masterpiece less than perfect. Even though those stiffs didn’t think it deserved a Palme, it is differently a Criterion release worth watching.