Aside from the 300 point font screaming headline, "HATE IS HERE TO STAY" that hovers over the central story, this time around I noticed how Fuller's cynicism manifested in all of the periphery interactions of Krsty McNichol's character. The movie opens with the nice young woman taking a dog she hit to a vet, where she's promptly treated with the assumption that she's not going to want to pay the vet bill. She's instructed to post "found dog" signs and ask for a reward because, as the nurse suggests, she's probably going to want her money back. No chance she took the dog in and would be willing to pay just because she's compassionate to living things? Then a man…

Samuel Fuller tackled the subject of racism throughout his career, and something about his brutish, direct approach holds up as a surprisingly thoughtful means of addressing the complex, corrosive sin at the heart of America. White Dog is to the point even by Fuller's standards, introducing a lovable if ferociously protective stray dog, only to reveal a mind conditioned to attack black people on sight. Fuller triangulates the beast with the innocent, naïve young white woman (Kristy McNichol) who rescued him and the black man (Paul Winfield) who attempts to retrain him, casting the dog as the manifestation of racism as mental disease, not inherently present but gradually formed through trauma and teaching.

But while there may be Fuller films…

“that dog is sick — then he should be cured.”

The setup of White Dog works incredibly well. Late one night, a young woman accidentally hits a white German shepherd with her car. Set against the bright openness of the Hollywood Hills, Julie (Kristy McNichol) is introduced as fiercely independent – a young actress living alone, ambitious, resistant even to letting her boyfriend move in with her. Out of guilt she takes the dog in temporarily while trying to track down its owner, not wanting this sudden responsibility to interfere with the life she is trying to build for herself. But slowly she starts building an attachment to him. Fuller almost shamelessly engineers the bonding: her career frustrations deepen, men…

In his almost lost drama about racism - just recovered by Criterion in late 2008 - Samuel Fuller tells a very simple but effective story. A woman hits a dog at night and takes it home with her, nurses it back to health and lets it become her companion and protector. After a short time however, she discovers that her new friend is a "white dog" - an animal who is trained to attack black people. She gives it into the hands of an animal tamer who tries to condition it to trust people of color again.

Fuller's drama is told in a straightforward, almost conventional way. The explosive power comes from the subject - racism is openly formulated as…