Good Boy

Sometimes you can't help but be impressed by how enterprising some individuals really are, because there's something wonderfully crazy about deciding to produce a horror film with a dog in the lead role. This stands in stark contrast to an otherwise often stagnant genre where old ideas are recycled and rehashed over and over again. A steady stream of soulless, easily digestible stories that are often more about making a quick buck than engaging and challenging the viewer.

Because that's exactly what {Good Boy} manages to do. On paper, it's obviously a seemingly charming gimmick and not much else. But the creators, led by Ben Leonberg, manage to deliver so much more. In {Good Boy}, we find a story filled with melancholy and personality, peppered with a few chills and eerie moments, told entirely from the perspective of the dog {Indy} and without any real dialogue. In other words, there are no poorly computer-animated talking dogs here.

{Good Boy} doesn't try to reinvent the wheel either. The film is basically just a simple story about a man, his dog, and a haunted house out in the countryside where a dark entity lives. We follow {Todd}, a young man with some form of chronic lung disease who has inherited his grandfather's old house, which is rumoured to be haunted. {Todd}'s sister is keen to remind him of this, and calls him anxiously to check on his health.

{Todd}, for his part, dismisses it all as nonsense, as any other normal person would probably do. But as his illness worsens, the darkness in the house also becomes more palpable and active. {Indy} behaves like any other loyal dog: he follows his owner's every move and whines anxiously over his deep coughs and deteriorating health. But more than anything else, {Indy} senses the malevolent entity lurking in the house, creeping between the shadows, observing from the silence and intruding into dreams.

And to be honest, from the very first moment, just a few minutes into the film when {Indy} starts hearing and seeing things, seemingly staring into thin air, as a pet owner you get an uneasy feeling in your stomach. It's a phenomenon that presumably all dog or cat owners have experienced at some point, when your furry friend stares blindly into a corner or at a seemingly empty doorway and you wonder: what are they actually seeing? This is used incredibly effectively here by the filmmakers to create genuinely uncomfortable scenes that get under your skin.

This is combined with simple but effective camera work, a tight and restrained script, and sparse but extremely effective music that adds a golden touch to the scenes with mood-enhancing, simple tones. They have done a great job of constantly blocking out as many people as possible, and they constantly work to show us the world from {Indy}'s perspective. Where much is out of focus or where we are only allowed to see parts of things, and rarely the whole picture.

{Indy}, played by the {Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever} of the same name, is understandably the highlight of {Good Boy} and stands for what is (probably) the best dog acting ever, if that's even a thing? But all the reactions feel very natural, and the fact that exactly zero CGI was used for the dog is impressive to say the least. His presence elevates and adds a twist to what would otherwise have been a fairly mundane "haunted house" film, turning it into something completely unique. The story also carries clear parallels between the supernatural elements in the house and the inevitability of {Todd}'s chronic illness, which becomes something of a metaphor for trying to deal with something beyond one's control.

From {Indy}'s perspective, it all becomes even more heart-breaking when he is forced to watch, relatively helpless, as his beloved owner gets worse and worse. Especially towards the end, there are some scenes that hit you hard in the gut as a pet owner, playing heavily on your emotions, and the finality of being forced to move on. It's a consistently brilliant piece of craftsmanship, with a tight running time of just 75 minutes that focuses on the most important aspects and not much else. In fact, a lot is left open, but details can be found for those who choose to study the background more carefully. This fills in some of the gaps, but hardly everything.

Whether this is a positive thing or not depends largely on you as a viewer. If you appreciate having a story served up in its entirety on a silver platter, then {Good Boy} is not for you. Likewise, the film can feel slow, despite its relatively short running time, largely due to how heavily the production relies on silent storytelling. But ultimately, with {Good Boy}, Leonberg shows that he has an eye for detail and storytelling, as well as a clear penchant for the more experimental. We can only hope that he continues along the same path in the future, because {Good Boy} is definitely one of the most original and heart-wrenching horror films in a long time. It's tight, smart, and insanely charming.