Closet Picks
White Dog

White Dog

Samuel Fuller, 1982

Spine #455

Picked by 1 guest

Drama / Horror / Thriller

Part of David Lean Directs Noël Coward

Criterion TMDB

Directed by Samuel Fuller

Written by Curtis Hanson, Samuel Fuller

Cinematography Bruce Surtees

Edited by Bernard Gribble

Cast Kristy McNichol, Paul Winfield, Burl Ives, Jameson Parker, Christa Lang, Vernon Weddle, Karl Lewis Miller, Karrie Emerson

Picked by

Laurie Anderson

“Samuel Fuller. Best first scene of any movie. She's waking up, alarm clock rings, and she's really late. I think of her often because she runs to the tap, puts some hot water into a cup of coffee, and puts instant coffee into the hot water in the tap. And that's the beginning of a day that goes from there, from that place to much worse, a day that just falls apart.”

Laurie Anderson

Also mentioned as part of David Lean Directs Noël Coward

Dick Cavett

“Oh, you probably wonder why I’m saying that. David Lean Directs Noël Coward. Whose good idea was that? I hope they were well paid. And the films, if you’re wondering, are In Which We Serve, This Happy Breed. Beautiful. Blithe Spirit, of course, and Brief Encounter. I bet you’ve never made movies that good.”

Dick Cavett
Francis Ford Coppola

“Well, Noël Coward is a wonderful playwright and songwriter. And, when I did The Godfather, I sort of got to be so well known at a young age that they wanted me– They offered me many opportunities to direct operas or plays. So I did do a play, and it was a play by Noël Coward called Private Lives. And I did it with a sort of unusual twist to it. And I’m going to apply that same twist on this new material that I’m looking at.”

Francis Ford Coppola
Charlotte Wells

“This is David Lean Directs Noël Coward, which includes Brief Encounter. I actually haven't seen the other films in this collection, which is exactly the type of thing I wanted to take on today. Brief Encounter has one of my favorite strings of dialogue of all time. She says, 'I've fallen in love. I am an ordinary woman. I didn't know such violent things could happen to ordinary people,' which is devastating and that's generally how I like my cinema.”

Charlotte Wells
Jack Garfein

“And I met David Lean because he directed for the same producer, Sam Spiegel, that did The Strange One. David Lean didn't like him very much. We met, we had dinner one night and we discussed the unhappiness with which Mr. Spiegel put both of us through. In my case, as he said, he would never let him interfere with his work as a director with the actors. But you know I was very young when I worked with Spiegel.”

Jack Garfein
Matthew Broderick

“This is David Lean and Noël Coward, both of whom… nobody better. Brief Encounter is very famous. There’s no more heartbreaking, yearning, regret-filled movie, but ends with a certain amount of Happiness and peace somehow. In Which We Serve you might not have seen, but is magnificent. Noël Coward is in it. This Happy Breed I have not seen. Blithe Spirit, Rex Harrison. I haven’t seen that in a long time, but I can’t wait to see it again. Can’t believe David Lean directed those.”

Matthew Broderick