Possible Spoilers- What makes this film for me is how "simple" it is. A rabid dog killing people. The first half is a little slow, but it builds the main players up well. The second half plays out like "Jaws on Land" with the victims stranded in a broke down Ford instead of a boat. The acting is top notch. The boy playing Tad does some of the best child acting I've seen, I really felt bad for him. The dog attack scenes just look real. No CGI crap. The ways the attacks are edited just make them appear more violent and realistic. Cujo has aged well and doesn't feel dated. I'm pretty sure if this film was remade today the attack scenes wouldn't look any better or more realistic. I wouldn't classify this as a Horror film; it's more of a Suspense or Nature Gone Wild film. Cujo has no motives. He's just doing what rabid dogs do. He didn't have some bad childhood or lazy camp councilors to blame. This doesn't mean some scenes aren't scary. As Cujo slowly gets worse he becomes sensitive to certain sounds, this was somehow quite creepy to me. Toward the end the poor guy seems to be losing his mind. At one point the endless screaming of the mother and child make Cujo attempt suicide via a car door. Most of the folks who get killed in Cujo have it coming to them. This makes the dog some kind of "Karma Soldier", taking out the white trash so-to-speak. I mostly just felt bad for the dog.
Review of Cujo
