Available only on big screen

The American Cinematheque’s The Return of Movies Not Available on Video opens Friday at the Egyptian with Samuel Fuller’s most controversial film, “White Dog” (1981). Fuller and Curtis Hanson adapted it from the Romain Gary novel, only to have Paramount shelve it. Like the book, it’s about a German shepherd trained to attack only black people.

The film stars Kristy McNichol as an actress who unwittingly gives a home to the dog, and the late Paul Winfield as the professional handler who attempts to retrain him. After a slow start, it becomes one of Fuller’s action-packed, modestly budgeted melodramas in which the white dog becomes a powerful metaphor for racism.

The double feature after “White Dog” offers two John Brahm films starring Laird Cregar: “The Lodger” (1944), a well-respected remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1926 silent based on the Victorian thriller, and the enduringly potent “Hangover Square” (1945).

In the second film, set in 1908 London, Cregar plays a young pianist-composer who suffers blackouts, triggered by severely discordant noises, during which he is driven to murder. Unaware of this, his psychiatrist friend (George Sanders) recommends he balance work with play, which leads Cregar to a music hall. There he is bedazzled by an ambitious singer (Linda Darnell) who coaxes him to write songs that will launch her into the big time. (Bernard Herrmann’s superb score is a major asset.) It’s obvious where the film is heading, but superlative acting and direction make the getting there thoroughly engaging.

On Saturday at 5 p.m., the series presents “Buck Benny Rides Again” (1940), starring Jack Benny, and W.C. Fields’ “The Man on the Flying Trapeze” (1935) -- to be followed by a double feature at 8:15 p.m.

Kicking off the nighttime bill is director Jacques Demy’s “The Model Shop” (1969), which features the return of the title character from his first film, the exquisite “Lola.” In that 1961 work, Anouk Aimee plays a cafe entertainer in the French port city of Nantes who never gives up her hope that the American father of her son will one day return.

The central figure of “The Model Shop” is a restless young man (Gary Lockwood) with whom an older and defeated Lola crosses paths. The film, which takes place in less than 24 hours, begins on a Saturday morning in a Venice, Calif., apartment in which Lockwood lives with his fed-up girlfriend (Alexandra Hay). In essence, he begins a search for $100 for an overdue car payment and ends up finding himself at the “model shop” of the film’s title, a tawdry Santa Monica Boulevard pinup studio in which Lola is working.

In this place of fantasy, Demy found the perfect metaphor with which to link the relationship between Lockwood and Aimee to its setting, Los Angeles, a gritty foil for Demy’s lyricism. What better background could there be for expressing the transitory nature of love?

Screening after “The Model Shop” is writer-director Bill Norton’s “Cisco Pike” (1972). Despite an unsatisfactory ending, it is a powerful lament for the death of the hopes embodied by the early rock music scene. It has an excellent cast: Kris Kristofferson in his screen debut as a passe rock idol, Gene Hackman as a cop who tries to blackmail him, and Karen Black as the girl too in love to leave him.

Gaynor rarity

When Janet Gaynor was awarded the first best actress Oscar in 1928, it was for her work in three films. The least frequently revived of them is “Street Angel,” which will be shown Monday at the Silent Movie. (The other two are the landmark “Sunrise” and the popular “Seventh Heaven.”)

To watch “Street Angel” now is to realize that as an extravagant tear-jerker it could never be made today. Nevertheless, it remains deeply moving, thanks to its stars and especially director Frank Borzage. Charles Farrell plays a struggling Neapolitan painter who finds his inspiration in the waif-like Gaynor. Inevitably, an unjust incident in her past will catch up with them. It says a great deal for Borzage’s skill -- and that of Farrell’s as well -- that the painter comes across as an innocent in the throes of love rather than a narrow-minded prig. “Street Angel” is also a triumph of Expressionistic art direction and luminous cinematography.

Note: On Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. the American Cinematheque will present the first L.A. retrospective of the work of animator Joanna Priestley. It will feature nine of her films, a documentary on the making of her newest cartoons and a discussion with Priestley. (323) 466-FILM.

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Screenings

The Return of Movies Not Available on Video

* “White Dog”: 7:30 p.m. Friday

* “The Lodger” and “Hangover Square”: 9:30 p.m. Friday

* “The Model Shop” and “Cisco Pike”: 8:15 p.m. Saturday

Where: American Cinematheque, Egyptian Theatre, 6712 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood

Info: (323) 466-FILM; www.americancinematheque.com

Silent Movie Mondays

* “Street Angel”: 8 p.m. Monday

Where: Silent Movie Theatre, 611 N. Fairfax Ave., L.A.

Info: (323) 655-2520; silentmovietheatre.com