Through a Dog’s Eyes: A Sensory Voyage
Elizabeth Lo’s “strangely beautiful” (Screen International) exploration of Istanbul’s street dog population, Stray, opens Friday, March 12 at FACETS Virtual Cinema. In anticipation of the film’s release, we’ve curated a list of arthouse canine flicks that are shaping the future of the genre as we know it.
People really love dogs, that’s just how it is, how it’s always been, and how it will remain. Taking a look back through our shared cinematic history, this seemingly universal appreciation for canines has been a mainstay. Often a staple of the “family movie night” category, films like Lassie, Balto, Old Yeller, Homeward Bound, Beethoven, and Hachiko, to name a few, have become all-ages classics.
In recent years, there has been a sort of resurgence in this type of cinema, with titles like A Dog’s Purpose, it’s sequel, A Dog’s Journey, and Harrison Ford vehicle, The Call of the Wild. While these films are all centered around dogs, and themes of human-animal relationships and interactions, they are far from identical. Each film in the canon of “canine-cinema” chooses to portray dogs in unique ways, whether its talking dogs, real dogs, stop motion dogs like those in Isle of Dogs, or evenclassic Disney style animation, Lady and the Tramp, each choice in the depiction of the dogs (and the humans) in film adds to what type of message the filmmakers are trying to get across.
Whether the film is from the dog’s perspective or the human’s, featuring happy-go-lucky, wisecracking comedians or serious and hardened survivalists, every creative choice shapes how the audience will encounter the story. Even when the filmmakers venture in the uncanny valley with fully CGI dogs like in Scooby Doo: The Movie, and The Call of the Wild, this is a choice that relates to the filmmaker’s ideas about what it means for us as a species to coexist so closely with these animals.
Another aspect of these films that is often overlooked but necessary when understanding the films that offshoot from this genre, is the commercialization and serialization of these films, with arguably the most famous example being Air Bud. The 1997 film spawned a cinematic universe that extended all the way to 2013 and honestly, its probably due for a comeback any day.
From the original 5 Air Bud films where a dog plays basketball, football, soccer, baseball, and volleyball, to the spin-off Air Buddies films that follows the puppies of the original Air Bud as they travel to space, the north pole, and Alaska, and as they gain superpowers, and embark on Indiana Jones style adventures. With 16 films in the universe, it is hard to ignore the commercial success and universal marketability of dog films and it is something to think of as we dive into the genre.
Even in these films that are, for the most part, inoffensive, family-friendly, and easy to enjoy, they still offer interesting insights into the relationships between humans and animals. However, because of these films being so “safe” there is a sort of stigma attached to any film that features a dog, or animal-human relationships. When most audiences see a film centered around dogs, the snap judgement is that “this film is for kids,” and therefore, it is not worthy of many viewers discerning eyes, even though there can be a lot more to it.
With this list however, we want to highlight films in the genre that elevate themselves to a point beyond “safe” and “family-friendly” films where you can see the perspective, you can see the message and you can think about what it means to be part of this symbiotic relationship that we have been born into. While these family films discussed above are often about people and their dogs, the films that follow are often about dogs and their people.
From films shot from the point of view of a dog, to films about a canine insurrection that happens when humans overstep the limits of domestication, all the way to a film that takes a surreal dive into what it means to be a dog lover. These films offer up ways to look at things in a different way, through a dog’s eye. From issues of race and religion to homelessness, to culture, and even to life itself, these reflective films offer us a transcendent experience in which, for a few hours, we leave our human body behind and exist with the eyes and the heart of a dog.
Stray
Directed by Elizabeth Lo
Director Elizabeth Lo’s debut feature shot through the eyes of three of Turkey’s thousands of stray dogs who roam the streets freely under the government’s liberal No Capture – No Kill policy. Stray explores what it means to live as a being without status or security, without stability or any real structure. Through the real stories of these stray dogs and the people who share the streets with them, this documentary presents our own culture in an unusual new light, while simultaneously highlighting a typically unseen culture that exists between the strays that roam the streets of Turkey and other countries in the world.
Throughout the film the lives of the dogs intersect with those of humans in interesting ways, like when the dogs bond with a group of young Syrians who live on the same streets these dogs do. The film masterfully observes the shared resilience and bond between these young men and their canine friends and raises important questions about how our society treats its most vulnerable members. This film is an observation and a reflection on our civilization through the unfamiliar gaze of three stray dogs. Through their canine eyes, we are shown a human world ruptured by divisions along class, ethnic, and gender lines, a world that we know all too well, but often times do not see.
Strayis available to watch at FACETS Virtual Cinema until April 8.
Heart of a Dog
Directed by Laurie Anderson
Acclaimed multimedia artist Laurie Anderson’s dreamy and drifting autobiographical documentary about memory and experience, love and loss, and how our fragmented past makes up our current self. A documentary that takes its time to ponder and reflect, one that trails through Laurie Anderson’s personal life and the loss that she has experienced. Where she positions stories about her dog Lola Bell and her passing, right alongside similar stories and tragedies about her husband, her mother, and her friends. Showing in an intimately personal way that loss hurts no matter what we are losing, from human to dog, it all hurts the same.
Having shot most of the film herself, this film has a distinctive personal quality, and with the stories that she narrates over the footage, it can almost be too personal at times. Stories from her past and thoughts from the present, some that she claims she has “cleaned up” as to spare the audience the graphic or horrific details. However she does say something along the lines of “the more you tell a story the more you forget it”, bringing into the question the reliability of the narrator, and the legitimacy of the memories that are being shared with us. This film is an exploration of how much the details really matter when compared to the feeling. This is a film that challenges the audience to see things in a different way and let go of certain parts of the self as we know it and just experience a story in the moment, with the heart of a dog.
Rent Heart of a Dog now from FACETS.
Space Dogs
Directed by Levin Peter and Elsa Kremser
A film about exploration and discovery, that follows travelers in a strange land. A story that chronicles the history of Laika, the first living being to be sent into space, a stray dog picked up off the road by Soviet scientists as a prime candidate for a trip into the unknown, a legend follows Laika’s fateful journey that one day her soul fell down to Earth on a comet and roamed the streets of Moscow as a ghost ever since she was sent to her death in the previously unknown space above us all. The film follows two of Laika’s descendants, two street dogs navigating the urban environs of modern Moscow.
Shot from a dog’s perspective this film explores city life, and social interactions in a whole new light, similar to the explorations of Stray, this film takes a step back and approaches the familiar from a new angle to see if there is anything new to be learned. From the strange music pulsing through buildings in this seemingly alien landscape to the unusual quality that any stranger on the street takes on from this point of view. This film puts the audience at a different level from what they are used to. They are thrust into unfamiliar lands with unfamiliar gazes and are asked to think about what they are seeing and experiencing. From the surreal landscape and sounds to the archival footage of the Soviet Space Program that gets spliced into the film intermittently, this film begs questions of perspective, responsibility, and the limits of the symbiotic relationship between humans and dogs.
White God
Directed by Kornél Mundruczó
A film about the relationship between a young girl and her dog that gets put under sever strain. A new bureaucratic regulation gets put into place where any family that owns a mixed breed dog gets severely tasks as an attempt to ensure that only dogs of a certain pedigree get to live the good life. Because of this tariff that is put into place, many families are forced to get rid of their dogs and thus the streets and the shelters become overcrowded. Through homelessness and imprisonment, the dogs in this film band together and decide that enough is enough, and an all-out war between dogs and humans begins.
White God is a warning to man that there are limits to the symbiotic relationship we share with dogs. The film follows a story that is in ways, the direct opposite of Stray that we discussed earlier. In Stray, the dogs can roam the streets of Turkey freely without fear of capture or killing, whereas the dogs that inhabit the world of White God are subject to horrible imprisonment and bureaucratic tariffs placed on their heads that prevent many loving families from taking care of them. This film is a warning and an allegory for the dangers of bureaucracy, the evil of man, and the strange value we place on the history of beings, from dogs to man.
Rent White God now from FACETS.
Amores Perros
Directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu
The debut film from renowned director Alejandro González Iñárritu, Amores Perros is a film about three intense, intertwining stories all related in some ways to dogs. A film that has been compared to Pulp Fiction for its intertwining multiple narratives and bold, kinetic style. However, where Pulp Fiction touts movie-obsessed elements and genre-inspired influences. Amores Perros has much more gravity, where it may ditch some of the playfulness to show stories of morality with realistic, visceral portrayals of people living in desperation with broken dreams. Like the stories shown in the Turkey-based documentary Stray but taking place on the other side of the world in Mexico City, Amores Perros shows a bond between man and dog that goes beyond just being a pet and an owner. This film shows the struggles people face and the animals that face these struggles with them.
The three stories that intertwine in this narrative are violent and intense, and the use of dogs in these stories differs from the other films on this list. Whereas other films may want to show the love that animals can represent this one heads slightly in the other direction. In Spanish, the word “perros” literally means “dogs” however it can also be used to refer to misery. So, the title of the film, roughly translated is “Bad Love” although it is often referred to as “Love’s a Bitch” in marketing. Regardless of the translation the title is supposed to say “Love is Misery” in one way or another. This is an interesting connotation whereas most family-friendly dog films show the dogs as bundles of joy and the other films on this list show them as ways to explore some of the most mysterious parts of our humanity and culture. In this film, maybe the dogs are meant to explore some of the darker parts of our humanity.
Rent Amores Perros now from FACETS.
Doggiewoggiez! Poochiewoochiez!
Directed by EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE!
From the found footage video art collective EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE! Comes an experiment in film unlike any other. This film is an attempt to recreate Alejandro Jodorowsky’s surreal masterpiece The Holy Mountain using only “dog-related footage”. The film utilizes images and scenes from famous family-friendly dog films (like the ones we discussed earlier), B-Movie cash grabs from the early 2000’s (like the film Quigly where Gary Busse gets in a car accident and turns into a dog), and strange educational, or promotional VHS tapes marketed towards dogs and dog lovers (like Dog-On Television: Television for Dogs, Effective Pet Massage for Dogs, and Go Dog Go Presents: Dog Sitter, The Video Made for Dogs!) to create a truly chaotic and strange experience.
Doggiewoggiez! Poochiewoochiez! is an experience more than a film. Without seeing The Holy Mountain, the film may just seem like chaotic nonsense. It can be hard to follow for sure when most of the dialogue in the film comes from cutting together conversations with second long clips from hundreds of different films and videos. It can also be very jarring when the climax of the film is a dizzying, hypnotic trip up a hellish tower of dog faces overlayed and duplicated on top of each other, with fire and spinning pentagrams in their eyes. But within this film, for those familiar with The Holy Mountain and those interested in surreal film experiences, it is such a strange, wonderful ride. There will be moments of recognition and realization, like the segment of the film that splices together video sequences that contain various discussions of neutering dogs, a segment meant to mirror that of Axon’s introduction in The Holy Mountain. Axon is the chief of police, who has a sanctuary of 1000 human testicles, he is a man who has done to man what so many people have done to dogs. While not a one for one recreation of The Holy Mountain, the structure is there, the characters and themes and there in this dog footage. It is an echo of it in ways that cannot be put into words, it is a connection that has to be experienced with an open heart and an open mind so that the final message of Doggiewoggiez! Poochiwoochiez! Can ring in the ears of all who view it, “God is just dog spelled backwards”.
Rent or purchase Doggiewoggiez! Poochiewoochiez! on the EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE! website.
Tyler Meder is an Editorial Assistant Intern at FACETS. He received his B.A. in Communication, Film, and New Media from Carthage College after completing his thesis on shot on video horror films. He has contributed work in video and writing to multiple industries including live theatre, which earned him an honors in Animation and Video Production from the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
