MovieChat Forums > White Dog (1982) Discussion > TV Movie?

TV Movie?

posted 16 years ago by bok602
3 replies | jump to latest

Just to mix things up, let me ask this:

Did this film start out life as a TV movie and then get elevated to feature film status by the infusion of a few extra dollars?

The entire production -from script to cast to direction- has the look and feel of a made-for-TV movie. To my mind this may be why it never got a US theatrical release. The subject matter would hardly have been so controversial as to prevent a theatrical release when plenty of films dating as far back as the 50's dealt with racial issues even more directly. Even ROOTS was more daring.

I also am aware that a great many US TV movies did get theatrical releases in Europe and elsewhere.

However I can see that very few US audiences would pay money to see a TV movie in a theatre.

The Cast is pure TV movie casting. The script is vintage TV movie fodder. The sets and production design is something out of a Hollywood backlot and the cinematography is unmistakably TV movie.

My thought is that the film had been put into production and was about to start filming when somebody at the front office said to go ahead and make it a feature film, so they threw in a few cuss words (mild ones) added one scene of -almost- graphic violence and letterboxed it.

Otherwise it is a TV movie to its very core.

"If you don't know the answer -change the question."

[–] pleasure-friendly 16 years ago

No, it was made theatrically and I don't think at all that it feels like a TV movie.

[–] bok602 16 years ago

I disagree. With the exception of a few cuss words and some rather tame violence grafted onto it, the entire film has the look and feel of a TV movie.

I'm aware that it was released as a theatrical feature, but there is no escaping the feeling that it must certainly have been conceived and produced as a TV movie.

I don't mean to say that it was a TV movie that was shown on TV and subsequently released to theatres; what I mean is that I think that at some point very late in production, the decision was made to scrap any idea of a TV showing and release it to movie theatres, which necessitated the addition of the language and violence.

There is no question in my mind that this film started out life intended as a made-for-TV movie and then got promoted to theatrical feature. If it had started out as a direct to theatres feature it would have employed a more "Hollywood" cast, rather than a stable of TV actors.

"If you don't know the answer -change the question."

[–] elm0catt 16 years ago

NO it was never ever intended as a TV movie.

Any awareness of Samuel Fuller's career or even watching the documentary on the new Criterion release would have informed you that your feeling was wrong.