1983 be a bumper year for stephen king book make it to the big screen . christine and the dead zone and cujo be all release within a few month of each other . while the dead zone be easily the pick of the bunch and christine and cujo be both pretty bad and and it a close run thing a to which be the less of the two . if push for an answer i would say cujo marginally be the weak . donna trenton ( dee wallace and fresh from success a elliot mom in e. t the extra terrestrial ) be a mother whose marriage to husband vic ( daniel hugh kelly ) be hang by a thread . she be have an affair with a local worker and and be now dwell on whether or not to leave her husband . drag into the marital heartache be young tad trenton ( danny pintauro ) and son of donna and vic and and a pretty mess up kid with a chronic phobia of the dark which often lead to severe panic attack . donna and tad take the family car to a nearby mechanic yard for repair and but a they arrive their car splutter to a halt . thing get a heck of a lot bad when they discover that the mechanic and joe camber ( ed lauter ) and isn not there ( he have be savagely kill by his pet dog cujo and a gigantic st. bernard which be recently bite and infect by a rabid bat . ) soon and the dog have them trap in their car and be try everything to get inside the vehicle to tear apart these two hapless victim . the weather be swelteringly hot while not a living soul know theyre there while the car would not start while and the dog seriously want their blood . cujo have potential to be a genuinely taut siege thriller and but it never really click into gear . i have read the book and it be quite disappointing certainly for king so it hardly surprising that the film version amount to so little . on the printed page and king be at least able to generate a degree of tension and but the film be critically hamper by the fact that a st. bernard simply isn not very scary . the visualness of the film medium serve a a constant reminder that cujo be a st. bernard . in the book and it be possible to forget this . in the book and cujo sometimes almost seem to assume the guise of a monster . even with the relatively short run time of an hour and a half and cujo become a tedious and patience straining experience and occasionally unintentionally funny and certainly never as suspenseful a it would like to be . they have even omit the book cruelly downbeat end and replace it with an all well that end well conclusion so that audience can go home in a cheerful mood . chalk this one down as yet another inferior king adaptation .