Baxter (1989) review

Bull terrier Baxter (voiced by Maxime Leroux), who strongly desires to live among human beings and longs for a "dominant master," at first is given to an older woman as a gift but she becomes a recluse, then he lands with a young family (he attempts to kill their baby) and finally ends up in the arms of a troubled lad who's committed to building a scale model of the Führerbunker and compares one of his classmates to Eva Braun.  It's an intriguing (and daring) attempt to delve into the psyche of a (murderous) canine - the screenplay is by Boivin and Jacques Audiard, who would go on to become a director himself - and pulls off this marvelous trick of making the audience, for the last act, root for the dog to actually dispatch the boy ... because at least Baxter has a Code he lives by, while the kid is just a lunatic.  It leaves you with a sense of despair (which was definitely intentional), and I hope there was an animal rights group hanging around the set....