Culture
‘Good Boy’ is a good and gruesome pet-centered horror movie
By: Gordon Briggs
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I’ve seen several thrillers in my day that had celebrities with multi-million dollar budgets, and plenty of jump scares, only to have them fail because they didn’t have a point of view on their material. With a modest budget, singular setting, and a furry four-legged hero, Good Boy manages to become an entertaining horror film set entirely from the perspective of a dog.
While the film could have come across as goofy and cloying, the filmmakers deliver an engaging horror flick through precise shot composition, a skillful use of point of view, and a protagonist that the audience is always rooting for.
The premise is intriguing. Here, we follow the story of an ordinary pet owner who moves into a new home with his beloved dog, an adorable retriever named Indy. Unbeknownst to Indy’s owner, the new house is inhabited by supernatural forces lurking in the shadows. As dark entities start to threaten him, his brave dog comes to the rescue.
What’s cool is the film’s visual acuity. By having the film unfold from Indy’s perspective, the world feels more intimidating. The cinematography relies heavily on low-angle shots to depict the world from Indy’s short stature, creating a consistently disorienting and unsettling effect. This choice enhances our rooting interest in our protagonist, not because he’s a cute animal, but because he’s a literal underdog and the odds are against him.
Furthermore, throughout its runtime, the camera rarely, if ever, shows an unobscured human face, particularly that of Indy’s owner, Todd. Human faces are typically fractured, blurry, or shot out of focus, emphasizing Indy’s limited perception and his reliance on other senses (like smell) to identify his owner. This alienation of human appearance heightens our feelings of unease because we cannot visually identify with the film’s human characters.
If there’s a gripe, it’s that the central premise is so simple that the film can come across as a one-trick pony. It’s told from a dog’s P.O.V., but now what?
However, with a running time of only 78 minutes, it never wears out its welcome.
Rating: ★ ★ ★