Cujo
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
|
| Author | Stephen King |
|---|---|
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Horror |
| Publisher | Viking Press |
| Released | 1981 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 320 pp |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-451-16135-1 |
| Cujo | |
|---|---|
 The Theatrical Poster for Cujo |
|
| Directed by | Lewis Teague |
| Produced by | Daniel H. Blatt Robert Singer Neil A. Machlis (associate producer) |
| Written by | Stephen King (novel) Don Carlos Dunaway Lauren Currier |
| Starring | Dee Wallace Stone Danny Pintauro Daniel Hugh Kelly Christopher Stone |
| Music by | Charles Bernstein |
| Cinematography | Jan de Bont |
| Editing by | Neil Travis |
| Release date(s) | August 12, 1983 |
| Running time | 91 min |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $5,000,000 |
| IMDb profile | |
Cujo is a horror novel by Stephen King, published by Viking in 1981. The book tells the story of the middle-class Trenton family and rural Camber clan in Castle Rock, Maine. Marital and financial difficulties of the mundane sort plague disgraced advertising man Vic Trenton and his adulterous wife Donna. Their domestic problems are dwarfed by the mortal danger when Donna and her four-year-old son Tad are terrorized by a rabid St. Bernard named Cujo.
The novel was adapted into the 1983 film Cujo, directed by Lewis Teague from a screenplay by Don Carlos Dunaway and Lauren Currier. The film was #58 on Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Moments.
Due to the popularity of King's novel and the subsequent film adaptation, the name of "Cujo" has since entered the realm of popular culture as a generic term or sarcastic insult in reference to a psychotic, violent, or imbalanced dog.
[edit] Plot summary
The story is set almost entirely in the fictitious town of Castle Rock, Maine. The novel centers on Cujo, a St. Bernard that belongs to Joe Cambers and his family.
The novel begins with a reference to Frank Dodd, the Castle Rock deputy sheriff whose murder spree was the central episode in the first half of The Dead Zone. There are some hints in the story that Cujo might be possessed by Dodd and that Dodd is haunting the Trenton house. Except for these vague hints, there are no supernatural elements in the book.
While hunting in the fields around the Cambers' house, Cujo is bitten by a bat infected with rabies. While Cujo begins to succumb to the disease, Joe's wife and son leave on a trip to visit relatives. Soon afterwards, Cujo attacks and kills the Cambers' neighbor, Gary Pervier. While Joe's family are on vacation, Joe has plans with Gary for a trip of their own. Joe goes to the Pervier home to meet Gary, only to find Gary dead. Before Joe is able to call the police, Cujo kills him as well.
The Trentons -- Vic, Donna, and four-year-old Tad -- are having problems of their own. Vic has discovered that his wife has been cheating on him. In the midst of this household tension, Vic's business is failing, and he is forced to leave on a business trip to Boston and New York. Donna, home alone with Tad, takes their failing Ford Pinto to the Cambers' for repairs. However, the car breaks down when they reach the farm. With no one at the Camber home except for Cujo, a three day struggle begins to outlast the dog in a siege of the stalled car. Hunger, thirst, and fantasies of escape methods conspire to tease Donna and Tad during the hottest summer in Castle Rock history. A Castle Rock police officer, George Bannerman, arrives fortuitously but is himself killed by the dog before calling for help. Vic, worried that his wife has not answered the phone at home, returns to Castle Rock and figures out where they are. By the time Vic arrives, Donna has killed Cujo in a gory showdown with a damaged baseball bat and Tad has died of dehydration. (In the movie, Tad survives as producers felt that the death of a child would be too horrifying).
[edit] Themes
Atypically for King's early work, there is an exploration of how marriages work or do not. This is done by contrasting the middle-class Trentons with the blue-collar Cambers.
The most unusual stylistic element of the narrative is that it occasionally switches to the perspective of the canine title character. Like Kojak from The Stand, Cujo sees humans as extraordinary, nearly divine figures (for example, all adult males), refering to them as THE MAN, THE WOMAN, and THE BOY.
