Cujo

Joe Camber's dog, Cujo, is infected with rabies from a bat bite. Cujo is a St. Bernard. Yeah. Written in 1981 by Stephen King, and adapted into a film starring Dee Wallace in 1983.

This book/film contains examples of:

 * Angry Guard Dog: Subverted with Cujo- he attacks people because of rabies, not because he was bred that way.
 * Asshole Victim:
 * Beware of Vicious Dog: Although, to be fair, nobody knew he'd become vicious.
 * Big Friendly Dog: Cujo was one, before he got rabies.
 * Also a genuine problem in the making of the film because they simply could not get the St. Bernard playing him to act aggressively - they had to replace him with a cunningly disguised Rottweiler for several crucial scenes, and tape his tail to his leg so he didn't wag it constantly. Aaww.
 * Catch Phrase: An in-story example. Vic Trenton, who works in advertising, along with his partner, Roger, creates a character called "The Sharp Cereal Professor", who becames hugely popular. His catchphrase is "Nope, nothing wrong here".
 * Domestic Abuser: Joe Camber.
 * Eye Scream:
 * The Film of the Book
 * Heat Wave: The story takes place during one, which leads to
 * Infant Immortality: Averted
 * Midlife Crisis Car: Steve Kemp refers to this phenomenon as "sports car menopause".
 * My Car Hates Me: Donna and Tad are trapped on the Camber's farm, because her car (a Ford Pinto) wouldn't start (actually she went there to get it fixed).
 * Police Are Useless: Sheriff Bannerman lasts about 30 seconds with Cujo, and he is by far the most effective cop in the book.
 * Spared By the Adaptation -
 * Things That Go Bump in The Night: The monster in Tad's closet.
 * Tragic Villain: Cujo. He's shown to suffer terribly from rabies, and he attacks people because he believes that they are responsible for his pain. At the end of the book, it's written: "It would perhaps not be amiss to point out that he had always tried to be a good dog. [...] He had never wanted to kill anybody. He had been struck by something, possibly destiny, or fate, or only a degenerative nerve disease called rabies. Free will was not a factor."
 * He was also possibly influenced by the ghost of a previous Stephen King villain...
 * Not to mention his brief encounter with Randall Flagg.
 * What Did I Do Last Night: Acording to King's auto-biography, this entire book. There are worse things to do on a bender...
 * Your Cheating Heart: Donna has had an affair with Steve Kemp and broke it off. This comes back to haunt her when a rejected Kemp vandalizes the house and wipes off a very important message on the blackboard that delayed her and Tad being found - contributing to.
 * Xenofiction: Parts of the book are told from the perspective of Cujo. They show him to be a Tragic Villain.